Skip to main content

Full text of "The Great Modern French Stories: A Chronological Anthology"

See other formats 


Google 



This is a digital copy of a book that was preserved for generations on Hbrary shelves before it was carefully scanned by Google as part of a project 

to make the world's books discoverable online. 

It has survived long enough for the copyright to expire and the book to enter the public domain. A public domain book is one that was never subject 

to copyright or whose legal copyright term has expired. Whether a book is in the public domain may vary country to country. Public domain books 

are our gateways to the past, representing a wealth of history, culture and knowledge that's often difficult to discover. 

Marks, notations and other maiginalia present in the original volume will appear in this file - a reminder of this book's long journey from the 

publisher to a library and finally to you. 

Usage guidelines 

Google is proud to partner with libraries to digitize public domain materials and make them widely accessible. Public domain books belong to the 
public and we are merely their custodians. Nevertheless, this work is expensive, so in order to keep providing this resource, we liave taken steps to 
prevent abuse by commercial parties, including placing technical restrictions on automated querying. 
We also ask that you: 

+ Make non-commercial use of the files We designed Google Book Search for use by individuals, and we request that you use these files for 
personal, non-commercial purposes. 

+ Refrain fivm automated querying Do not send automated queries of any sort to Google's system: If you are conducting research on machine 
translation, optical character recognition or other areas where access to a large amount of text is helpful, please contact us. We encourage the 
use of public domain materials for these purposes and may be able to help. 

+ Maintain attributionTht GoogXt "watermark" you see on each file is essential for informing people about this project and helping them find 
additional materials through Google Book Search. Please do not remove it. 

+ Keep it legal Whatever your use, remember that you are responsible for ensuring that what you are doing is legal. Do not assume that just 
because we believe a book is in the public domain for users in the United States, that the work is also in the public domain for users in other 
countries. Whether a book is still in copyright varies from country to country, and we can't offer guidance on whether any specific use of 
any specific book is allowed. Please do not assume that a book's appearance in Google Book Search means it can be used in any manner 
anywhere in the world. Copyright infringement liabili^ can be quite severe. 

About Google Book Search 

Google's mission is to organize the world's information and to make it universally accessible and useful. Google Book Search helps readers 
discover the world's books while helping authors and publishers reach new audiences. You can search through the full text of this book on the web 

at |http : //books . google . com/| 



THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 



THE GREAT MODERN 
STORIES SERIES 



THE GREAT MODERK 

FRENCH STORiES—Compfled and 

Edited with an Introduction by Wil- 

lard Huntingtott Wright 

THE GREAT MODERN 

ENGLISH STORIES— Compiled and 
Edited with an Introduction bjr Ed- 
ward J. O'Brien 

THE GREAT MODERN 
AMERICAN STORIES-Compiled and 

Edited with an Introduction by Wil- 

Ham Dean Howells 



In Preparation 
THE GREAT MODERN 

GERMAN STORIES 
THE GREAT MODERN 

RUSSIAN STORIES 



THE 
GREAT MODERN 
FRENCH STORIES 

A CHRONOLOGICAL ANTHOLOGY 



• • 



COMPILED AND EDITED 
WITH AN INTRODUCTION 

BY 

WILLARD HUNTINGTON WRIGHT. 



NEW YORK: 
BONI AND LIVERIGHT 



Copyright, 1017, 
Boni & Llyeright, Inc. 



r 



PrinUd in tbe U. S. oit Amerkai 



/^ 



To JAMES GIBBONS HUNEKER 

Who has done more than any other critic 

in making known to America 

the best literature of 

modem Europe. 



\j^\f , is> 






CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction: The Evolution of Modern French 

Fiction WUlard Huntington Wright xiii 

Solange Alexandre Dumas i 

Napoleon and Pope Pius VII Alfred de Vigny i8 

Croisilles Alfred de Musset 28 

The Mummy's Foot Thiopkile Gautier 57 

The Marquise George Sand 70 

Z. Marcas Honori de Balzac 95 

The Venus' of Ille Prosper MMmie ' 122 

^ Herodias Custav Flaubert 154 

The Attack on the Mill £mile Zola 186 

The Elixir of the Rev. Father Gaucher 

Alpkonse Dazidet^, 224 

Father and Son Guy de Maupassant 234 

The Piece of String Guy de Maupassant 249 

A Question of Diplomacy Guy de Maupassant 257 

Sac-Au-Dos JoriS'Karl Huysmans 2 

The Substitute Frangois Coppie 298 

Lost Words of Love Catulle Mendks 309 

--' The Procurator of Judea Anatole France 314 

The Idyl of an Old Couple. Pierre Loti 329 

Attitudes Paul Bourget 336 

A Married Couple Marcel Prevost 377 

Love in Thule Maurice Barris 383 

The Return Charles-Louis Philippe 392 

Biographies 397 

Bibliography 405 




INTRODUCTION 

THE EVOLUTION OF MODERN FRENCH FICTION 
By WILLARD HUNTINGTON WRIGHT 

IN the eighteenth century French literature, like French 
painting, comprised many divergent tendencies. Never- 
theless, all the writers of that period had in common a 
quality which bound them together and anchored them to 
their age. This quality was one of process, and had a perfect 
cotmterpart in the French painting of the same epoch. 
There were more or less set forms to which every writer 
adhered with some degree of restriction. The academy, in 
this case actually non-existent, though hypothetically very 
5trict, placed its limitation upon all the books of the age. 
Evidences of technical, if not stylistic, imitation abounded; 
precedent played a large part in the novelistte conception of 
his work; and although here and there, where the individual 
possessed sufficient genius to be conscious of his own powers, 
arbitrary laws of structure were occasionally broken, it was 
not until the so-called Romantic Movement that the classic 
limitations of form were definitely done away with. 

In Rousseau came the first indications of this emancipa- 
tion. It was the "Nouvelle H^oise" and "fimile" which 
disrupted the French literature of the eighteenth century, 
and indicated the trend of the nineteenth. With Rousseau 
individualism appeared abruptly in the midst of literary for- 
malities; and from that day to the present the artificalities 
of classicism have not successfully reappeared. Although 
Marivaux purified the novel in so far as he relieved it of all 
polemical considerations and made of it a thing of recreation 
and amusement without resorting to travesty or satire, 
Rousseau infused a new spirit into fiction and opened up 

• a. 

xui 



xiv INTRODUCTION 

that naturalistic vista the end of which has not yet been 
reached. 

After 1790 there was a hiatus in French fiction save for 
the works of Mme. De Stael and Chateaubriand. These 
two writers stood so con^icuously above their contem- 
poraries that one might write a history of the development 
of French letters without mentioning any other names during 
the first two decades af the nineteen^ century. A great 
number of minor poets sprang into being, but with the 
exception of Ch6nier no others were of any importance till 
the advent of B6ranger and Lamkrtine; and the novel was 
almost exclusively in the hands of such writers as Fi^v^, de 
Maistre and Constant. 

Mme. de Stael, however, had much to do with the liberal- 
izing of French letters. On the formal and aesthetic side 
of literature her influence was nugatory, but she reacted in 
a salutary manner against the cramping restrictions of the 
purely classic viewpoint. She brought new, if borrowed, 
ideas to the novel; she broadened its outlook; and she 
awakened in the yoimger generation of writers a spirit of 
freedom and intrepidity. It was the fecundity of her thought 
which enriched all the serious fiction writing which fol- 
lowed her. Her "Ddphine" and "Corinne," though scarcely 
read today, played very much the same part in the devel- 
opment of French fiction that the works of Richter and 
Goethe played in the development of German fiction. The 
novel became a medium not for aesthetic form but for 
esthetic ideas. In her the literature of her coimtry donned 
the garb of cosmopolitanism. 

Qiateaubriand, to the contrary, had an influence which 
was largely aesthetic. The "properties" of fiction were 
markedly developed by him. He used the manifestations 
of life as the vehicle for an artistic expression. He even 
brou^t the pomp of the Christian religion back into the 
novel; but with him it was used purely as a medium, just 
as he used nature as a means for obtaming color. He saw 
in Q&ristianity not doctrine but poetry, and its beauty to 
liim was largely the beauty of antiquity. It supplied him 
with a varii>!firatA/^ imrrp^ -»f 'itpran «p>'»ndor, and his style 



INTRODUCTION xv 

gave added richness to the French language. Chateaubriand 
devdoped the French novel in direct line with Rousseau's 
naturalism, and ivas one of the stepping-stones between 
Rousseau and that later school which has been called the 
Romanticists. Chateaubriand was in fact the father of that 
school. The yoimger men, no longer temperamentally in 
harmony with classic stiffness, saw m him an exalted artistic 
ideal worthy of emulation. Sand, Victor Hugo, De Vigny, 
and Flaubert patterned their literary edifices in accord with 
his designs. 

Mme. de Stael and Chateaubriand, representmg the two 
complementary phases of literary art, were the precursors 
of the new literature. The former gave yoimg France its 
modem point of view, its freedom from conventional pro- 
cesses of thought, and the courage to attack life with inde- 
pendence. The latter gave young France the consciousness 
of imaginative artistry, and its first purely aesthetic con- 
ceptions. 

The work of Mme. de Stael and Chateaubriand, together 
with that of Rousseau, contained the germ of modem real- 
ism. Once their influence took hold, the spirit of dissatis- 
faction, unrest and revolt began to spread among practically 
all the writers of the yoimger generation. The new ided 
was rushing rapidly toward a climax. Poetry was the first 
form of literature which definitely established the revolu- 
tion, although signs of it had been detected in periodical 
literature. La Muse Frangaise was the forum of the 
new men, and its contributions had many illustrious names 
signed to them. Popular feeling also changed. A few 
belated classicists clung tenaciously to the dying ideals of 
the past, but their works were lost in the torrential onmsb 
of liberated youth. French genius had already broken down 
the academic boimdaries and was heading madly into new 
fields. The movement was not wholly French, however. 
Other nations took a hand in it. Walter Scott was a vital 
factor in the revolt. He was read extensively and imitated 
in France. Byron also took part in the new iconoclasm. 
Germany, too, contributec^ ^o the upheaval, largely through 
the good offices of Mm** i** ^♦^wH, wl>o ^onc+ituted herself 



Kvi INTRODUCTION 

the interpreter of German thought and fashions as impressed 
upon her by Wilhdm Scfalegd. 

The first indirect though definite statement of the school's 
aims appeared in the fancifully sentimental works of the 
voluminous Nodier. His importance today is mainly his- 
torical, for despite his versatility he achieved nothing of the 
first order. Beranger and Lamartine bridged the two shores. 
Neither of these poets were full members of the Romantic 
school. With one hand they held to the past while with 
the other they reached out for the new. Beranger especially 
belonged to the passing regime, and though he had no in- 
fluence, one cannot overlook him in studying the evolution 
of French poetry. Lamartine, far more individualistic, 
founded his verse on de Stael and Qiateaubriand, but he 
was too firmly wed to classic form to wield any great power 
in the movement. His "Meditations" and "Harmonies" 
helped to awaken the new spirit; and later his "Jocelyn" 
and "La Chute d'un Ange" brought him still closer in touch 
with the broadening vision of his contemporaries. 

The movement was crystalized, however, in the cinacle 
which comprised Hugo, Sainte-Beauve, Vigny, Nerval, the 
Deschamps brothers, Gautier, Borel, and Lamartine. Hugo 
was the outstanding figure among them, and his "Hemani," 
which appeared in 1830, epitomized the IFermentation. Hugo 
led the movement in its early stages, and it was his influence 
which gave it much of its generating power. He showed it 
the way in poetry, drama and fiction. Because of his ver- 
satility and genius he is regarded as the embodiment of all 
the factors of the school, but he was, in fact, only one of 
the manifestations of the emancipation in French letters. 
On the purely aesthetic side he was deficient. He constantly 
sacrificed form for matter, and he lacked that intellectual 
consciosity which is as necessary to great art as is either 
emotionalism or sensuousness. Furthermore, he was too 
deeply concerned with the grandiose to develop that finesse 
and senstbiliU which were emphasized in other men of the 
movement. Hugo nevertheless, because of his colossal 
imagination, expressed the spirit of the movement with 
greater comprehensiveness and power than did any of his 



INTRODUCTION xvii 

confreres. He disr^arded all classical formulae; he mobil- 
ized the diction of the novel; and he had mudi to do in 
making arbitrary the selection of subject-matter. 

Alexandre Dumas phre, worked along lines similar to 
those of Hngo; and his contributions to &e new movement 
in reality complemented Hugo's. Much of his work was 
not actually written by himsdf. He no doubt revised and 
corrected it, but it would be almost a physical impossibility 
for any one man to have produced the enormous amount of 
fiction which bears Dumas' name. However, there are cer- 
tain books whidi are unmistakably his. They are full of 
color and vigor, and they reveal a hand highly skilled in 
tiie labor of his craft. Hugo wrote few short stories, and 
ihese — such as "Claude Gueux" — are not representative of 
him. Furthermore, it is impossible to select from the main 
body of his writings extracts which in themselves are com- 
plete from a short-story standpoint. Dumas, however, had 
much of the conte writer's temperament, and it is possible 
therefore that he had a greater influence on the short story, 
as an art form, than did Hugo. In any event — so similar 
in attitude was the work of these two men — that we are able, 
by referring to the writings of either one, to determine their 
^)ecific contribution to the evolution of French fiction. 

Alfred de Vigny struck another note. His development 
was more in line with Lamartine's than with Hugo's, and his 
influence in the liberation of the meditative side of subject- 
matter was of vital importance. A much later school, com- 
prising such men as Mallarm6, Villiers de I'lsle-Adam, 
Vi616-Grifiin, Stuart Merrill, Mortes, Leon Lierx and 
Samain, owed much of its "philosophy" to him. Vigny's 
nature was pessimistic and he regarded life in a far more 
intimate fashion than did Hugo. His style, however, was 
colder and more severe. In his stories and novels as well as 
in his verse one occasionally feels that the correctness of 
diction was his primary concern, and as a result he was per- 
haps the most perfect stylist of his period. 

Both Vigny and Lamartine, especially the latter, had 
intellectual affinities with the past Alfred de Musset, how- 
ever, succumbed wholly to ^e new tendencies; and yet, 



xvm INTRODUCTION 

despite the wide influence of Hugo, he remained almost 
entirely aloof from the imitation which characterized the 
work of others in the movement. In him was more realism 
of theme than in Hugo. He cared little for form in its 
X3thetic sense, and coidd have said, with the Impressionists, 
that he created comme Voiseau^ chante. . He felt things 
keenly; he saw life througBTils sensitivity; and his nature, 
given to excesses, was sufficiently reckless to produce books 
which, through their sheer emotional pwwer, gave much im- 
petus to the tide of realism. He dealt in the solidities of 
literature, for he understood the building up of character; 
and he could present an episode in such a way as to give 
it depth and breadth. His first principal book, "Les Contea 
d'Espagne et dltalie," prefigured the thematism of Zola, 
In this work, as in later ones, enthusiasm and imbridled 
youth were the most conspicuous traits. But just such a 
sweeping revolt was necessary at the time. That he later 
lost his fiery courage did not militate against his earlier 
power. Classicism was dead. Even Ponsard's "Lucrfece" 
in 1846 was but a transient resuscitation of the corpse. 

Directly opposed to Musset was Thtophile Gautier, 
Gautier laid almost complete stress on means. To him sur- 
face form was all-important. He was the lapidary of the 
movement and, as such, contributed to it a most necessary 
quality. From the standpoint of technical perfection his 
poems outrank those of any of his fellows. Language to 
him was a plastic medium which it was his aim to mould 
into precise and exquisite shapes. So completely did he sacri- 
fice all substance to form that he never attained more than 
two dimensions. He produced a flat, pleasing surface with 
a beautiful texture, — ^his works are like sensuous and color- 
ful posters. But it was important that these qualities should 
have been developed, for masses, no matter how solid, cannot 
exist in the highest art unless organized by line arid by the 
subtleties of formal relationships. Gautier, the pre-eminent 
craftsman, the master manipulator of words and phrases, 
was the literary complement of Musset 

The ''Romantic" school was a widespread uprising against 
the literary conventions of traditiorL The older cla^c cyde 



INTRODUCTION 

of letters had attained its florescence, and during the eigh- 
teenth century it had rapidly gone to seed. After a period 
of fructification the new era was bom. It was a renaissance, 
like that which came to painting at about the same time; 
od, as in the case of all new cycles, it took on the char- 
^uter of an upheaval. The men of the movement of 1830 
We the pioneers of the modem age. Only in their spirit 
of modernity were they related. To consider them as a 
group, and not as individuals, is to lose sight of the under- 
lying significance of their work and to misunderstand the part 
^ played in the evolution of literary history. 

hi Hugo, Dumas, Vigny, Musset and Gautier were summed 
^ the school's immediate tendencies. Hugo pwinted the 
^y in all departments. Dumas helped make possible an 
^nwiginative eclecticism, Vigny, primarily a thinker, devel- 
oped and preserved the intellectualism of the movement. 
Musset was its unordered force. Gautier confined himself 
to the technical niceties of expression. Each one, though. 
^ guided by the same aims; each one was influenced by 
^e modem mental attitude; each one was a phase of the 
'^tion against classic limitations and an exponent of the 
imiinating individualism of the new century. 

But as yet this movement had possessed no emancipator 
of subject-matter. Hugo and Dumas still clung to imagina- 
tive document, and it was from this document that the 
^ool acquired its name. It was inevitable, hoT7ever, that 
J^istorical romance should have furnished the first materials 
of an aesthetic renovation, for it gave free rein to selection 
8nd invention, and its scope was unlimited. But the very 
choice of such arbitrary material was an indication, not of 
t romantic tendency, but of the spirit of modem realism. 
That which drove the new men into revolt was the feeling 
that the classic forms were false to life. They desired a 
wholly unrestricted hand in the statement of their art. The 
rigid formalities of the past no longer satisfied their craving 
for expression; and they demanded a method in keepmg with 
life itself — a method related to the changing, moving, meta- 
]Doi][diising world of action and emotion of which they were 
part and to which they fdt their genius allied. They be- 



INTRODUCTION 

lieved that art and life should no longer be divorced. There* 
fore, their battle agamst restraint was the battle for realism 
in art; and in order to fight that battle most effectively they 
chose the subject-matter which would permit them the 
greatest freedom — the subject-matter, in short, whidi stood 
for the very lack of restraint for which their methods were 
to strive. Once the battle had been won, once the new 
methods had been vindicated, then the document itself 
would become closely related to realistic life. 

Subject-matter, as well as methods, must pass throu^ a 
process of emancipation; and it was not until Standhal and 
Sand entered the ranks of literature that the last phase 
of realism in France was achieved. 

George Sand's work embodies many characteristics. In 
it there were undeniable affiliations with Hugo's and Dumas' 
thematic romanticism. There was also tfie unrestrained 
emotionalism of Musset. Even the analytic tendencies of 
Vigny found a place in her writings. But, in addition to 
these influences, there was an individual quality which was 
to have far-reaching effects. Her life was varied and tu- 
multuous, and her work, a direct outcome — a record almost — 
of her experiences, not only ran the emotional gamut but 
served as a vehicle for her introspective contemplations. 
Her books were always inherently personal: they reflected 
the mood of the moment; and it was this very concern with 
a segment of actual material existence — the segment of 
which she was a part — that went far toward shunting the 
new realism of means from its romantic subject-matter and 
turning it upon the track of documentary immediacy. 

Sand's earlier novels — ^**Valentine," "Jacques," "Lelia," 
"Leone Leoni" and "Mauprat" — are little more than fic- 
tional accounts of her physical and intellectual experiences. 
Historically they are without special significance, save only 
as they foreshadowed the work which followed. "Jacques" 
had a tremendous influence, extending even into Germany; 
but the novels which owe their inspiration to it are largely 
the by-products of fictional history. Not until the appear- 
ance of "La Mare au Diable," "La Petite Fadette" and "Les 
Maitres Sonneurs" did George Sand take her place in the 



INTRODUCTION 

T:voliitioo of modem literature. These realistic bodu^ 
thoogli id}dlic and unpretentious, lacking oHnplicated situa- 
tions, and breathing a somewhat sinq)le pastoral atmo^^e, 
were her permanent contributions to the movement They 
constituted a new stq) toward natural observation. Her 
later works, such as "Mile, la Quintinie," "Mile. Merquem," 
and "Jean de la Roche," were more sophisticated, less natu- 
ral in their efusodic develc^xnent; and while they showed a 
keener and maturer gra^ <m character and more deft han- 
dling of materials, they possess also a paichant for dramatic 
artificialities, wiiich detracts from the purer, if ampler, 
realism of her earlier writings. It was, however, this realism 
wfaidi gave her the positimi she hdd in the development 
of lettos. When her final books were being written that 
devdopment had passed on into stronger hands. 

Stendhal holds a dual position in the history of the modem 
novd. Not only was he the forerunner of the naturalism 
of Zola, but he was also the father of that brand) of literary 
naturalism ^riiich we have come to call the "psychological" 
novd, and ^riiich received its first telling impetus in France 
in the woAs of Bourget It is diC&cult to say which posi- 
tion gave him the greater influence. Balzac studied him 
assiduously, just as nearly half a caitury later a new group 
of novdists, turning from Zolaism, based an important 
school on his methods. But, for the present, Stendhal must 
be considered in his relation to the eariy realism of the nine- 
teenth century, wiiich reached its his^est pomt in Balzac. 
To this realism he contributed a vital asset, and by supply- 
ing the one necessary element which was still lacking in 
the 1830 movement, he made possible the ^lendid florescence 
m the "ComMie Humaine." Without StandhaFs quota 
there would stiD have been a phase of literary methods un- 
exfdored; and untfl that pioneo: work was accomplished 
there could be no consummation. 

Stendhal's early critical works, espedsSiy his strange and 
fascinating analysis of love, "De I'Amour," allied him with 
the new movement; but it was not untfl the publication of 
his first novd, "Armance," in 1827, that his alliance became 
^gnifinmt. This was the first book o^ the realists in which 



INTRODUCTION 

analysis and observation were cardinal qualities. In fact, 
the attitude in this novel was new in fiction; and the meticu- 
lous manner of its presaitation was as revolutionary as its 
document. "Armance" was the undoubted forerunner of 
Balzac's "Scenes of Parisian Life"; and the photographic 
details of the intellectual antipathy between the hero and 
the heroine had much to do with a still later sdiool of 
letters. "Le Rouge et le Noir," appearing five years later, 
went still further in emphasizing realism in subject-matter. 
If we ignore the promise of Stendhal's unfinished novel, "Le 
Chasseur Vert," there can be no question that "Le Rouge et 
le Noir" is the greatest of his works. Certainly it was the 
most influential. It was not widely read, and few critics 
noticed its eccentric creator; but many writers studied it, 
and in time Stendhal's subterranean fame spread among all 
serious modem authors. 

Wherein Stendhal actually differed from his predecessors 
was only in his mental attitude. His characters were not 
drawn imaginatively, but grew slowly out of a mass of 
intimate psychological analyses. His examinations were frank 
and not seldom introspective. He was constantly probing 
for motives; and his viewpoint was sometimes bitter and 
C5mical, sometimes morbid, but always modem. What he 
achieved rounded out the researches of the new realists; and, 
although his analyses were confined exclusively to tj^pes and 
to rare individuals^ they nevertheless formed the basis of 
much of the literature that followed. Stendhal was as mudi 
a part of the so-called Romantic school as any other writer of 
his time. Because he made new experiments in document, 
whereas others experimented in means, he has suffered an 
enforced isolation. 

Balzac, quite to the contrary, was not an innovator, save 
in the narrowest sense. His supp>osed romanticism was a 
direct growth, along consciously selective lines, from the 
works of the earlier realists of the nineteenth century. His 
so-called naturalism can be traced to Rousseau, Sand and 
others. His "psychology" and his reverence for details were 
a gift from Stendhal. His technical means were merdy the 
sorted and rearranged methods of the nimierous iconoclasts 



INTRODUCTION xxiii 

vibo reacted against the restrictions of classicism. Mme. de 
Stael gave him his cosmopolitanism; and his artistic temper 
^Tas not unrelated to Chateaubriand's. Profiting by all 
these factors of freedom, he was at once the epitome of the 
oontemporary cycle and the link which joined the older 
composition to die new procedure. His works were as per- 
fect, from the standpoint of aesthetic form, as were the lib- 
erated ones of his own age. He restated the old in terms 
of the new. 

Balzac, like every impelling artist, stood between the two 
antipathies of intellect and emotion, and conlbined them by 
his will. There have been few writers with greater sensi- 
biUU; and, at the same time, there have been few more 
piurely impersonal workers. It may be said that he or- 
ganized the physical world — ^with its passions, hopes, strug- 
^es, aspirations and desires — ^into abstractions of form. But 
all this emotional upheaval, this gigantic welter of human 
inqnilses, this blind mingling of instinct and sacrifice and 
aiid)itiony represents only the material wherewith Balzac's 
massive structures were fabricated. The actual task of 
construction was accomplished by a process of conscious 
selecting, rejecting, changing and rearranging in accord with 
an organic aesthetic plan. He revised with the utmost care, 
at times rewriting whole sections of his books after they were 
in proof. His prodigious corrective labors have few paral- 
lels in literary history. Even the external evidence points 
to the fact that his primary concern was organization. 

But despite the calculating, almost clinical, precision of his 
literary method, he retained the virile reality of his medium. 
IDs conception of form was not that of a mould into which 
the document was to be pwured: to him form was the plastic 
and indivisible unity of shape and substance, the one grow- 
ing out of, and being identical with, the other — the unique 
presentation of every element in his art. It was this con- 
ception which made him the master workman and permitted 
him to portray at one and the same time the living life of 
actuality and the universal significance of life. And it was 
this conception which conferred upon his best books an 
esthetic worth over and beyond any exhibitory value. 



xxiv INTRODUCTION 

It has been truly said that even Balzac's minor characters 
have genius — that is, that they are intensely real, expresave 
of manifest truth, and alive with recognizable solidity. And 
the reason that it is true is that Balzac, capable of mter- 
preting philosophically what he observed, had sufficient power 
and insight to take nature and not merely the illusion of 
nature as his model. He first established a terrain and en- 
closed it with atmosphere; and the creatures who sprang 
from this soil created certain unescapable social, economic 
and intellectual conditions. Moreover, the generations of 
characters which came afterward were, in turn, the direct off- 
erings of this later environment, influenced by all that pre- 
ceded them, and influencing those who followed. 

The events in Balzac's books follow no artificial schedule, 
are based on no rigid literary logic, and occur at no stated 
intervals in response to the requirements of surface rhytlun. 
The rhythm in Balzac is not the rise and fall of effects, but 
the slow swelling and recession of causative undercurrents. 
His climaxes of interests are the foci of forces; and the 
completion of his form may come in the midst of tragedy, at 
the dawn of happiness, or at a point where the plot, regarded 
conventionally, is incomplete. The usual dcvisions of sen- 
timental interest are not to be found in his books. TTie 
story ends only when some cycle of inner energy has been 
exhausted. This is why Balzac is seldom trivially enter- 
tainmg. His appeal is intellectual as well as emotional; 
and unless one is chiefly interested in motives, the exterior 
of his work will appear amorphous. But, in reality he is 
the great modem master of literary form, and his heritage, if 
understood and assimilated, should indicate the literary path- 
way of the future. 

M^rim^e marked the transition between realism and natu- 
ralism. He was contemporary with the early realists of the 
nineteenth century, but although he had many tempera- 
mental affinities with them, he never became one of their 
number. He studied and worked independently, and thus 
avoided the tyranny of any fixed literary principle. His 
nature was not such that would have permitted of a con- 
suming enthusiasm. He was less passionate in tibe physioJ 



INTRODUCTION 

and emotional sense, and more passionate in the intellectual 
sense, than any one of those writers who were called Ro- 
manticists. Consequently his • avidity for knowledge pre- 
cluded adherence to one ideal; and we find in his work 
many t^dencies and many diverse inspirations. Sand, 
Stendhal, Gautier, Balzac, George Borrow, Rabelais, Tur- 
gcnev and even Crebillon contributed to his wriUngs—some 
indirectly, being merely intellectual appeals; others directly, 
dictating his selection of theme and coloring his point of 
view. 

In nearly all his stories there is the tincture of pessimism 
and disillusion. M6rim6e is never sentimental; his feelings 
never obtrude. He is interested in man as a highly sensitive 
and complex mechanism; and his powerful anti-democratic 
instincts, resulting in an ironical and often cruel attitude to- 
w^d humanity, render him wholly indifferent in his analyses 
and dissections. His contempt is the calm and detached 
disdain of a man sufficiently secure in his own superiority to 
regard the world with complete impersonality. There is 
no passicm in his hate, only a mild and aristocratic scorn. 
Many of his tales are frau^t with a grisly horror which is 
entirely divorced from any consideration for either his 
diaracters or the reader. Moreover, he has produced several 
important realistic stories which, though having unfamiliar 
mises en scene, C2LXTy the utmost conviction. "Colomba," 
"Matteo Falcone" and "Carmen," — the first two Corsican, 
the last Spanish — revisualize for us phases of life which 
we cannot help feeling are at least accurate. Their authen- 
ticity is unescapable. 

Merimee's ability to fuse life into alien milieus is due large- 
ly to his ability to sever his intimate convictions from his 
work. He was a painstaking student of history and archae- 
ology, was an inspector-general of historical monuments, and 
also held delicate diplomatic posts. These influences tended 
to emphasize the impersonality of his nature; and in his 
writings it was inevitable that this characteristic should as- 
sert itself. He was, above all, an artist in the narrower sense 
of the word. He had a remarkable faculty for memorable 
imagery; he possessed a fluent and colorful, though severe^ 



xxvi INTRODUCTION 

diction ; and he had a sure instinct for compositional balance^ 
altiiou^ he never attained to structural solidity. To the 
very last there was in him something of the dilettante. One 
feels that he was never willing to make the supreme sacri- 
fice to art — the sacrifice whidi implies absolute reverence, 
and which is required of all who would achieve supremacy. 

At the advent of Flaubert no problems of realism remained 
to occupy the writer's attention. The new methods had been 
firmly established: individual instincts were the only laws 
of expression. All thematic restrictions had been done away 
with; the novelist could treat of nHmporte quoi. Qassic 
composition had been reintroduced into literature by Balzac, 
who had thus drawn the old and the new toge&er and 
enunciated their fundamental relationship. Mlrim6e, by 
cultivating a scientific and impersonal attitude toward the 
materials of fiction, had removed the obstacle of sentiment 
which stood in the way of minute diagnosis. The potential- 
ities of realism had all been actualized. To have continued 
along the same path Would have resulted only in repeating 
or varjdng what had already been accomplished. Deca- 
dence would have at once set in, for, with the means at 
hand, it would have been impossible to create new aesthetic 
tissue. Flaubert, by pushing forward into virgin territory, 
saved the cycle from retrogression. He opened a new field 
of literary endeavor, and became the first great adventurer 
along that realistic tangent which we call naturalism. 

In order to imderstand the place that Flaubert holds in 
the evolution of fiction we must acquaint ourselves with 
his methods of work. He wrote very little. Foiur novdLs 
(one imfini^ed), a play and three ^ort stories represent 
practically his entire production. Withal, he worked con- 
stantly and with intense concentration; his exertions were 
of longer duration even than Balzac's. This was because 
he concerned himself mainly with the perfection of details. 
He accumulated innumerable notes. We are told that he 
would read a hundred volumes for one page of facts. It 
would take him many weeks to prepare himself for the 
description of one scene. He would write ten times the 
actual material needed, and then spend mondis on a scru- 



INTRODUCTION xxvu 

palous process of elimination. He made trips to the Orient 
in order to acquaint himself with an environment he wished 
to reproduce. His stup^idous researches into historical and 
ethnological data required years of application; and his 
"La Tentation de Saint-Antoine" was a slow growth through 
two decades. Moreover, these preparatory labors supplied 
him only with the framework of his story. He was equally 
meticulous in his fabrication of the book's verbal garb. 
Each sentence was constructed with the precision and care 
of a lapidary cutting a precious stone. He changed words, 
ronoulded phrases, added and subtracted syllables, re-ar- 
langed punctuation, balanced paragraphs: every section of 
ins writings passed through numberless redactions. No de- 
tail of style was so minute as to escape his consideration. 

Flaubert's aim was an accurate and meticulous recon- 
struction of life. We have recently learned that "Madame 
Bovary" was not an original story, but that both characters 
and incidents, with few variations, were adapted from life. 
Flaubert merely played the historian to actuality. '"Ma- 
dame Bovary," stripped of its exquisite garb, is Uttle more 
than a keenly analytic and wholly external account of a 
iMroman's disintegration under the corrosion of mediocrity. 
•'L'Education Sentimentale" follows the same structural 
method. "Salammbo" and "La Tentation de Saint-An- 
toine" are detailed reconstructions of antiquity; he built 
tx>th stories on data he had unearthed in historical records. 

Flaubert's contribution to literature, however, was an im- 
portant one. He has perhaps had more influence on the 
trend of modem fiction than any other writer during the 
last century. His "Madame Bovary" is, in a sense, one 
of the great classics of modem literature. It ushered in an 
entirely new school. It has been a model for scores of 
other novels; and in denying Flaubert the highest place as 
«i artist it is not my intention to question the necessity of 
his labors. In the history of prose fiction his p>osition is 
assured for all time. Without him we would be far behind 
oar present point of development. The work he did, and 
the work of succeeding writers who drew their inspiration 
fnnn his books, representated a phase of aesthetic evoluticm 



nvui INTRODUCTION 

through which literature had to pass before any progress 
was possible. 

Because Flaubert was so consummately a master of his 
materials and was able to state in such an impelling and 
enduring manner the results of his researches in documentary 
means, the new problems were solved and set aside with 
greater dispatch and thoroughness than had his genius been 
less powerful. Despite all its inherent defects, the age of 
naturalism was inevitable, just as was the age of Impres- 
sionism in painting. Without the experimentations of pio- 
neers no satisfying consummation can take place; and the 
strength of art's precursors determines the quality of ^at 
follows. There has been no more earnest and ^lendid in- 
novator than Flaubert His devotion to an ideal and his 
loyalty to its exacting demands calls for the highest praise 
and the most genuine admiration. To his unremitting toil 
we owe much that is best in all literature since his day. 

Both Champfleury and M^rimee — the first in "Chien- 
Caullou" and the second in "Colomba" and "Carmen" — 
had contributed to Flaubert's naturalistic attitude. Flau- 
bert, in turn, had given power to the Goncourts. And the 
Goncourts were the primary influence in what we have come 
to call Zolaism. These two brothers, Edmond and Jules, 
took a decided step forward from "Madame Bovary." In 
them Flaubert's aesthetic qualities were curtailed, and his 
naturalistic qualities emphasized. They wished to picture 
life in all its apparent unreason and chaos, and cared little 
even for the attractiveness of their record. Nor did they 
seek to arrange their adverseria. They were content with a 
series of realistic notations, provided the externals of nature 
were truthfully adhered to. In fact, they ignored, on prin- 
ciple, every artistic demand which might have ^ven the 
appearance of artificiality to their books, or which would 
have indicated a digression from the most scrupulous trans- 
cription of observable life. In the introduction to "Gcr- 
minie Lacerteux" they assert that, since the novel is beoom- 
mg "moral contemporary history" and has "undertaken the 
studies and duties of science," it is able "to claim the liber- 
ties and immunities of the latter." The credo implied in 



INTRODUCTION 

fbis pronouncement was in direct line with the new ten- 
dencies; for the novel, beginning with i^aubert, had en- 
tered upon a career of "social inquiry" and "clinical 
anal)^s." 

Where Zola differed from his predecessors was in his 
breadth and vitality of vision and in his singleness of pur- 
pose. Only in his very early books was he influenced by the 
so-called Romantic movement. Beginning with "La For- 
tune des Rougon" he was in full p>ossession of his medium. 
His goal had been definitely set, and his labor, for years to 
come, had been mapped out. He had conceived a gigantic 
task, almost equal to that of Balzac in the "Comedie Hu- 
maine"; and the greater part of his productive life was de- 
voted to its fulfillment. 

The characteristics of Zola's writings are easily defined. 
Subtlety was a virtue which his robust nature repudiated. 
The plan of his novels permitted only of the broadest brush- 
ing, and, in order to cover the field he had chosen, it was 
necessary to work rapidly and obviously. Therefore we 
can understand his methods at a glance; and, since he him- 
self on numerous occasions stated his aims, we need not fear 
that a brief summary will do him an injustice. 

Zola was the insatiable recorder of life. He dealt only 
with the materials of the visual, contemporary world. He 
held the mirror not up to nature but up to his immediate 
external environment. He cared nothing for philosophic 
causes, but solely for effects. The pageant idea of life was 
tq^rmost in all he wrote. Moreover, there was no self- 
imposed eclecticism: the mere existence of an object made 
it his rightful property. The important and the unimpor- 
tant, the aspect and the reality, the product and the by- 
product, had almost equal interest for him. WTien he gave 
reasons for actions, he went no deeper than economics and 
heredity. Whatever causation his books contain was based 
on physical laws, not on metaphysical principles. He ob- 
served and reflected life with inextinguishable ardor. No 
detail escaped tabulation, for his desire ^as to complete the 
rq^resentatioii zl extco'nds. As a result, his naturalism 
adhered to the visual deceptions of corporeality. 



INTRODUCTION 

It was inevitable, in the very nature of Zola's meAodical 
manner of writing, that the individual character should have 
been sacrificed to a t3npe. Many of the environments 
which he undertook to describe, and many of the people 
whom he bodied forth, were outside of his personal expe- 
riences. In order to acquaint himself with these unfamiliar 
facts, he constantly made notes, gathered data, and int«r- 
viewed whoever could throw li^t on the phase of life he 
wished to reconstruct. Many of the characters themselves 
were assembled in this fashion. Zola had no intimate knowl- 
edge of them, as had Balzac; and he studied them, not at 
first hand and in relation to the psychological and impulsive 
factors which determined their existence, but by their acts 
and appetites and social characteristics. In presenting them 
he was necessitated to build them accordmg to this new 
plan; and, in order to make them plausible and living, he 
had to endow them widi the traits of the class to ^hich 
they belonged. Consequently, they are simimaries of tem- 
perament, composite photographs of many members of a 
type, logical to a given set of human qualities. Althou^ 
their actions may be exaggerated and thdr fates exceptionily 
nevertheless they are all deductions from the same hypo* 
thesis. In them the human problem is merely carried out 
to a larger number of decimal pomts. 

The scenes of Zola's stories are constructed in the same 
manner. No setting is representative of a single village, 
a single middle-class household, a single phase of metro- 
politan life, or a smgle commercial environment. His "local 
color" is evocative of an enture side of the material worlds; 
and the fact that it is often overdrawn merely intensifies its 
general effect. Again, Zola's talent is most conspicuous 
when he is dealing with crowds. He has never been sur- 
passed as a depictor of large bodies in movement. This 
ability to visualize men and things in the ags;res;ate is due 
to his externally inclusive vision. Balzac created form, but 
Zola created only volume. Life to Zola was a world of 
shifting substances, and when he sought to reproduce th«n 
the result was massive and chaotic. 

In thus criticizing Zola no disparaRcmmt is Implied. He 



INTRODUCTION xxxi 

was in no sense decadent, and his work marked a distinct 
literary advance or. the experimental side of letters. Like 
all the naturalists, he was too busy amassing information to 
pause long enough to make profound inquiry into what he 
recorded. Even comparisons were rare in his works, and 
he seldom weighed facts in the scales of reason. His multi- 
tudinous minutise shaped themselves into moral and ethical 
articles of faith, and one can discover social doctrines dic- 
tating his impressions. But withal he was a researcher first 
and a reformer afterward; and his lessons, whether true or 
false, have no place in aesthetics. 

Those who see in Zola only a brutal unpleasantness bring 
forth the work of Daudet as evidence that naturalism need 
not be offensive. But Daudet, despite his affiliations, stood 
somewhat out^de the main naturalistic current. He lacked 
both the vigor and the earnestness of Flaubert, the Gon- 
oourts and Zola. Though deeply influenced by the books 
of these other writers, his nature was such that he femin- 
ized whatever vitality they imparted to him. His talent 
was li^t and poetic and unoriginal, and in general he 
touched only on the more pleasing and readily acceptable 
aspects of naturalistic document. He was victimized by 
a moral idealism which gave a tone of artificiality to his 
most serious endeavors. 

Daudet viewed life eclectically, and rigidly avoided those 
things which might have shocked his sensitive readers. 
Where Flaubert or Zola, for instance, would have dissected 
with stringent impartiality such a character as Tartarin, 
Daudet not only sentimentalized him but translated him into 
tenns of ironical and sometimes boisterous humor. Even 
in "Jack" a false pathos and genial humor are mingled 
^th the realities; and the same is true of "Le Nabab," 
although much of it is drawn direct from life. In "Numa 
Roumestan" Daudet's irrepressible optimism, working m- 
versely through the principal character, distorts the story's 
actualism to such a degree that we have, not a record of 
life itself, but an analysis of the sentiments at work upon 
life. "L'Evangeliste," the bitterest of all his novels, while 
ivfaolly objective in exea'tion. i** inimatAd hy a personal anc 



xxxii INTRODUCTION 

intimate religious purpose; and '^Sapho/' in which he attains 
to the height of his talent, is by no means free |rom falsities. 
Its skilful and delicate narrative art, rather than its vital 
accuracy, has preserved it, and its moral lesson cannot es- 
cape the most prurient reader. Daudet, in fact, may be 
considered as the feminine side of naturalism. 
^ The works of Maupassant are justly regarded as criteria 
for the modem short story. But although he carried this 
literary form to a high degree of literary perfection, his 
conception of it ^vas aesthetically limited. In practically all 
of his writings he depends for his appeal upon a single 
episode or effect, and consequently he does not attain to 
that goal toward which the best art has ever striven — 
namely, a formal and vmiversal statement of life. His* storks 
rarely impress us as broadly representative; and their char- 
acters are not alive with generative vitality^ The idea in 
Maupassant's narratives is what holds us. We remember 
plots, episodes and situations; we retain the atmosphere of 
events and feel the pressure of moods; but we do not ex- 
perience a sensation of having had an intimate and compre- 
hensive glimpse of the forces of nature. In truly great art 
the diaracters themselves, being creations, give birtti to the 
ideas; and the interactivity between these ideas and die 
personages from whom they arise produces in us a smise of 
reality. In Maupassant's stories the ideas are superimposed 
on the characters who are victims of the author's intellectual 
domination. 

Maupassant's bitter economy of means and his precise and 
condensed diction are directly traceable to Flaubert's per- 
fection of style; and his perceptive faculties were sharpwied 
by stud^dng "Madame Bovary" rather than "Germinie La- 
certeux" or "Le Ventre de Paris."^ He was interested, not 
in the panoramic side of life, nor yet in its mass manifesta- 
tions, but in its snatches of realistic drama. He enitomized 
Lthe journalistic in literature; for, though he adhered to 
actuality, his tendency was to choose only such stories as 
marked a variation from the perpetual commonplace.! He 
had a highly developed "news sense." The world existed 
for him as a source of "copy," and, with ahnost unerring 






fT 



INTRODUCTION 

accuracy, he went direct to those events which make up the 
teeming life of the daily newspaper. The "human interest" 
of his themes rarely escaped him,i and he emphasized it ^ 
continually, as in his famous "Boiile de Suife" which, ap- 
pearing in "Les Soirees de M6dan" along with stories by 
Zola, Hennique, Alexis, Huysmans, and C^rd, went far in 
establishing bis reputation. 

The instinct for the singular and the dramatic demanded 
a form of expression other than the novel, and since French 
literature already possessed the conte, which had been de- 
veloped from Des Periers and Margaret of Navarre through 
Marmontel and Voltaire and later found an echo in Daudet 
and Coppee, it is natural that Maupassant should have seized 
upon it and turned it to his own ends. It answered his 
purpose admirably; for the traditional French conte was not 
a skeletonized novel: it was based on a single incident or a 
sin^e point of view, and was constructed so as to be com- 
plete within its narrow boixidaries. 

Maupassant's most successful stories are not those with 
fhe most startling effects, but the ones in which the peasants 
of Normandy, his native country, are intimately depicted. 
It is here that his relationship to the naturalists is most 
clearly discerned. His sporadic flights iivto the supernatural, 
by which he is too often jifflged, were comparatively few, 
and none of them is representative of him at his best. Nor^ 
do his war stories attain to the height of his talent. Eiatf 
oepting "Boule de Suife" and "Mademoiselle Fifi," we fino^ 
much in them that is trivial and false. His numerous 
sketches dealing with sex, however, contain many excellent 
and memorable bits of writing. When Maupassant is not 
intro^)ective and haunted by his own perversions, these 
talents approach in merit his splendid Norman documents. 
But even his second-best stories are markedly superior to 
diose of either his forerunners or his followers. By devotmg 
his time and energy to this literary genre he achieved a mas- 
tery which has never quite been equalled. The best of our 
current short stories owe their finest qualities to his influence; 
and though he did not attempt the highest forms of arty 



xxxiv INTRODUCTION 

he made the narrow field which he iindertook to cultivate 
yield a rich harvest. 

Huysmans played a far less important part in Frendi 
naturalism than did Maupassant. For many years he was 
identified with the movement, and his earlier novels carried 
onward the ideas of the Goncourts and Zola. Later he took 
his stand on the psychological side of the naturalistic evolu- 
tion and laid a stone in the foundation of the structure wfaidi 
Bourget reared; but in the end he was swallowed up in the 
mystical obscurities of a violent psychic reaction. 

There was much of the arriviste in Huysmans, and his 
nature was such that he permitted himself literary indul- 
gences from which the Goncomls and Zola woidd have 
^runk. He saw naturalism only as an adventure in docu- 
ment: its significance escaped him entirely; and, with mor- 
bid and short-sighted ardor, he threw himself into the vortex 
only to be dragged to the bottom by the sheer weight of his 
misconception. 

Huysmans, however, served a good purpose, for he dem- 
onstrated that the new methods no longer held any inspira- 
tion for the serious writer, and that until another element 
was added to them they could be used only to restate the old 
or to express a dissolution of objective subject-matter. He 
did mudi to arouse interest m other literary problems and 
even pointed the way himself in "A Rebours" and "Li-bas." 
But in his last three novels, "En Route," "La Cath^drale** 
and "L'Oblat," he departs from strict psychological ^)ecu- 
lation and becomes enmeshed in morbid religious states of 
mind. In his eager and impassioned struggle for significant 
realization he ran the gamut from the coarsest materialism 
to the most obtuse spiritism. His "Marthe" gave undeniable 
indications of the beginning of naturalistic bankruptcy. 
"Les Soeurs Vatard'' and "En Manage" followed at inter- 
vals of two years, each addinsj to the revelation that after 
"Germinie Lacerteux" and "L'Assommoir" nothinsj remained 
to be accomplished until new means were brought into being. 
Huysmans' "Sac-au-Dos" (in that famous collection of 
Tories, "T^ Soir6es de MMan") made a strikmg contrast 
DintTi 'ii# -prnmnc "^niiie f^*^ •^M?^'' '>f Maupassant and the 



INTRODUCTION xxxv 

^irited and robust "L'Attaque de le Moulin" of Zola. It 
was more crudely naturalistic than any of the stories which 
accompanied it, but it served its purpose well; and one 
cannot ignore it in reviewing the evolution of modem French 
fiction. 

Few si^ificant advances have been made in the art of 
the short story in France since the termination of the natu- 
ralistic methods. The short story has gone through many 
variations, and several men — suci as Anatole France and 
Paul Bourget — ^have individualized it by personal and tem- 
peramental qualifications; but its actual evolution has pro- 
gressed only slightly. The important recent advances of 
this genre have taken place in England. However, a wealth 
of imaginative material has been added to it on the Conti- 
nent; and vmless we know the various ways in which it has 
been expressed by post-naturalistic writers we are unable 
to gauge either the character or the quality of the more 
modem literary achievements. 

Copp^e, for example, contributed nothing of an important 
nature to the development of the short story, but he never- 
theless gave an impetus to its manufacture. He did not 
regard his work solely with the eyes of an artist, nor did he 
even follow the artistic principles established by his prede- 
cessors. He was sympathetically, not to say sentimentally, 
interested in the lower-middle classes, and many of his best 
stories are those which deal somewhat idealistically with the 
life of the humble. He began his career as a poet, and 
while his verses are more capable than his stories, his chief 
influence has been m the field of fiction because of the great 
popularity which this latter type of his work has had. 

Coppte stemmed from Leconte de Lisle, and rarely in his 
entire career did he shsd^e off his heritage of suavity and 
mfldness. In his most characteristic writings he is more 
or less genial; there is an undeniable grace and facility to 
his style; he is simple and direct in his manner of expression; 
and— it must not be denied — there is at times a genuine 
beauty in his work. Furthermore, he never sought to curb 
his sympathy for the masses, and he permitted his idealism of 
sentiment to ha^e full play at all times. He was an instinc- 



xxxvi INTRODUCTION 

live story-teller and, within his limitations, closely followed 
the realistic means of his forerunners. 

Catulle Mend^s, on the other hand, was frankly tri^daL 
His art was in direct line with that of Gautier: he laid chief 
emphasis on the artifices of style. There is a lightness and 
frailty to his stories which gives them a delicate and exqui- 
site charm. But one never finds in him any of the prO" 
founder qualities of literature. What he does, he does per- 
fectly. His work is sensitively feminine, at times even frivo- 
lous; but in every age there is a place for such evanescent 
trifles as those on which Mend^s expends his energy, and he 
succeeds where scores of others have failed. He is highly 
artistic in the more superficial sense, for he developed the 
exterior of his medium with greater subtlety than did any 
of his contemporaries. When he attempts to go outsi(te 
of this restricted field — ^as in "La Femme-Enfant," for 
example — ^he fails. His gifts are too delicate for serious 
satire. 

A far more robust and more important talent is that of 
Anatole France. France, in fact, is a writer of great re- 
sources and broad capabilities. He is an apostle of Renan, 
and whether one reads his poetry or his short stories, his 
critical writings or his novels, his fairy-tales or his fan- 
tasies, one always encoimters a philosophical questioning, a 
deep-rooted skepticism, and an irony which colors and tinc- 
tures every phase of his subject-matter. As a stylist France 
has few modem equals. His writings are fluent and grace- 
ful without being weak or effeminate; and he can dothe 
the most commonplace material in such a way as to give 
it fascination and a degree of power. In the pure sense, 
however, France is not an artist, for he is concerned more 
with ideas than with formal relationships. The dimaxes and 
the effects of his stories are largiely intellectual. He often 
uses the fictional form where the great majority of writers 
would have used the essay form; and in "The Red lily," the 
one novel in which he attempted merely a psydiological 
delineation of character, we may seek in vain for those quali* 
ties which give his other works their permanent and un- 
questioned value. 



INTRODUCTION xxxvii 

That France has the mind of a critic rather than the mind 
if an artist, is attested to by the fact that, were he to strip 
lis books of their satire and their irony, they would lose 
nuch of their vitality. It is the idea that appeals to us 
n his principal writings; and in his best fiction we find but 
ittle plot. But what 4ie lacks in the ordinary quaKties of 
us craft he msrikes up for by his reflections, -his wit, and his 
)ermeating irony. France is not strictly a modem, and 
naturalism plays but a small part in 4iis literary conceptions. 
When he deals witfi current conditions it is in a somewhat 
'antastic spirit, and he often goes back to ancient times for 
lis themes, as in "Balthazar" and "Thais." But all his 
writings possess iiftlividuality; they are the works of a man 
)f broad culture, and they are executed with such competency 
ind with so -keen a sense for intellectual values that they 
lave taken their place in the very forefront of modem 
itcrary achievement. 

Pierre Loti is another writer of modem France whose 
osition is unique. He has almost nothing in common with 
is contemporaries. There are neither complexities nor 
ophistications in his work. He stands entirely outside of 
he evolution of modem literature; and yet his work pos- 
esses so many arresting qualities that it is impossible to 
^ore him. He has become a con^icuous figure in his 
ation's letters. 

Loti is primarily an exotic, and he oan convey more subtly 
ian any other writer of tis time the sensations, the sensu* 
usness, the color and 4he atmosphere of foreign and un- 
imiliar lands and conditions. His talent is primarily 
escriptive; he has a marvelous ability for projecting vivid 
od intense pictmrs. And he achieves his effects by the 
mplest means — ^by direct diction, by delicate suggestion, 
y precisely wrought impressions. Most of Loti's writings 
re tinged with a kind of dim melandioly which at times 
ecomes pessimism, and at other times is nothing short of 
loibidity. Tragedy appeals to him always, for in it are the 
}tentialities of delicate and sensitive emotionalism. 
"Tie Island Fisherman" is, in many ways, Loti's most 
laracteristic work. It possesses a subtle charm, a dramatic 



xxxvui INTRODUCTION 

simplicity and a naive statement of emotions, which bdong 
peculiarly to Loti's temperament and talent ''MadanMi 
Chrysanthfeme" is another one of his books which reveals 
his amazing ability to interpret accurately an exotic environ- 
ment. The East somehow seems more closely akin to his 
nature than does the West; but no matter what theme he 
touches he succeeds in giving it a vague and penetrating 
charm. 

Although Paul Bourget has been hailed, and actually re- 
gards himself, as the instigator of a new school of fictioii, 
he is, in reality, only a manifestation of the continuity and 
development of material naturalism in France. He carried 
forward the methods of Flaubert, the Goncourts and Zola; 
but instead of applying these methods to the world of ac- 
tuality, he used them to portray the complexities of the 
mind and the emotions. Only one side of naturalistic in- 
vestigation had been thoroughly accomplished by Zola and 
his school — namely, visible life. Bourget rounded out the 
investigation by delving into "states of mind" and setting 
down the results of his observations and analyses. In fact, 
he sought to do for the subjective life of man what Zola 
had done for man's external life. 

There were three different 3tages to Bourget's work, al- 
though at bottom it was all inspired by a desire to solve a 
single problem. In his first ftdvels — "Llrr6parable," 
"Cruel le Enigme," "Un Crime d'Amour," and "Andr6 Cor- 
nelius" — we find a preoccupation with material "properties.'* 
There are detailed descriptions of the settings wherein he 
has placed his characters — a meticulous concern with the 
numerous objects of life, which, in constituting atmo^ere, 
would tend to influence the natures of his personages. The 
personages themselves are presented to us in their reactions 
with environments. Their habits and activities are set down; 
and by this method, partly analytical and partly expositional, 
the picture of their natures are presented. In flie novels 
which followed— "Mensonges," "Le Disciple," "Coeur de 
Femme," "Nouveau Pastels" and "Cosmopolis"— Bourget 
plunges into psychology and concentrates his entire atten- 
tion on the obscure mechanism of the mind. At first he 



INTRODUCTION xxxbr 

aAeres rigorously to the scientific formula, but later he 
reveals strong temperamental afi&nities to the new Catholic 
movement, and, in a measure, repudiates his former methods. 
The introduction to "Le Disciple" gives indications of the 
birth of this new spirit. Bourget, however, continued his 
analytic investigations, revealing more and more his kinship 
with the individualism of Stendhal. His last books, such 
as "Terre Promise" .and "Recommencements," show a dec- 
lination of his purely experimental methods. A personal 
attitude enters into them: they grow less universal, after the 
manner of Huysmans; and they consequently lose some of 
their significance. 

Despite all the charges of morbidity and pessimism which 
may be brought against Bourget, he accomplished a vital 
literary task. The charge that he dealt almost exclusively 
with one paiticular social milieu does not militate against 
his importance. Undoubtedly there was a richer and more 
complex field for investigation among the more sensitive 
upper classes than in the lower intellectual walks of life, 
and therefore his passion for analysis found a greater range 
of activity. His diagnoses were for the most part clear and 
penetrating. He was a brilliant interpreter of motives and 
sensations; and his dissections of the human mind under 
various emotional and environmental influences were such 
as to make him the final exponent of constructive natural- 
ism in French. At his best he was possessed of imbiased 
and scientific accuracy. "Un Crime D'Amour" is an excel- 
lent example of this remorseless anatomizing of character. 
'^Mensonges" also diagnoses the sensual emotions with scru- 
pulous impersonality. But Bourget, though often best in 
the analysis of passional themes, does not limit himself to the 
psychology of sex. "Andr6 Cornelius," for example, is built 
on an entirely different set of emotions. "Le Disciple" deals 
with the disrupting moral effects of philosophical abstrac- 
tions; and "L*Emigr6" recoimts mainly a conflict of ideas. 
But one cannot point to any particular books of Bourget to 
the exclusion of others. Like Zola, he unearthed and re- 
corded many phases of life; and his gift to literature lies 



xl INTRODUCTION 

in the totality of his labors rather than in a few isolated 
documents. 

Prevost was also a disciple of psychological naturalism, but 
he did not carry his fiction so far into the realms of pure 
mentality as did Bowget. In fact, he sought to combine the 
two extremes of the naturalistic school: on the one hand, he 
clung to an honest and detailed realism, and on the othar, 
he investigated those states of mind which evolve from, and 
in turn govern, the actualities of life. Maupassant has as 
important an influence in Prevost's writings as does Bourget; 
but in thus attempting to embrace two fictional elements 
Provost has failed to strike any profound strata of literary 
investigation. His naturalism is not complete (certain of 
Maupassant's writings succeed far better in what they at- 
tempt to portray than "L'Automne d'uqe Femme"); nor 
is his psychology always penetrating. His "Letters of 
Women" and his "Demi-Vierges" are far more superficial than 
similar investigations by Bourget. "The Lover's Confes- 
sion," by posing sentimentality against psychology, renders 
itself false and ineffectual. Provost, however, has had a 
wide influence. Although he is neither rich nor complete 
in achievement, he has nevertheless pointed the way for 
other writers. Naturalism, if it is to be fully representative 
of life, must take into consideration the researches of Zola 
as well as those of Bowget, for both have their place in a 
complete statement of actuality. Pr6vost imderstood this; 
and herein lies much of his importance. 

Maurice Barres' first book was actually sponsored by 
Bourget; but Barres was in no sense a slavish follower of 
psychological naturalism. Indeed, he advanced a new credo, 
and his influence on younger France has been far-reaching. 
He reacted to the older moral dictates and boldly enunciated 
the doctrine of individualism. He was an apostle of the 
ego, and exhorted all the younger men to abide strictly and 
persistently by their personal dictates. In following out 
this shibboleth he was at first guilty of all manner of ob- 
scurities, and "Le Jardin de B6r6nice" and "Un Homme 
Libre" make difficult reading even for those schooled in the 
subtle ramifications of Bourget's mental probings. Even in 



INTRODUCTION xli 

iiis later works his idealism is too subtle for the general 
reader. He is, and perhaps will always remain, a literary 
man's novelist. 

In his psychological investigations Barres not often tended 
toward the metaphysical or, what he himself called it in 
connection with his earlier books, the "spiritual." But he 
was sufficiently clear and rationalistic in his methods, as well 
as in his mental attitude, to bring about what amoimted 
almost to a Barres cult. In his later novels — those which 
followed his famous "L'Ennemi des Lois" — there is a change 
in his point of view. He forgoes his pure logic and his 
insistence upon the doctrine of individualism, and lays his 
chief emphasis on what may be called the more "human" 
qualities in his art. His most characteristic works, however, 
and those which have given him his influence, are the ones 
in which he developed the psychological methods of fiction. 

There have been almost innumerable literary "schools" 
among the writers of the new generation in France. The 
majority of them have no deep foundation in aesthetic prin- 
ciples, and so can be regarded only as transient innovations. 
There are, however, in modem France many men v/ho have 
adhered to the best and most solid traditions, and who, by 
adding to the older forms their own personal talents and 
viewpoints, have produced fiction of lasting value. 

The most promising of these younger men was Charles- 
Louis Philippe, who died in 1909 at the age of thirty-four. 
In his death was cut short what was perhaps the most prom- 
ising realistic talent among the younger French writers. 
But Philippe has left us a number of books — such as "La 
Mire et TEnfant," "Bubu de Montpamasse," "Fire Per- 
drix," and "Charles Blanchard" — which possess many ster- 
ling and vigorous qualities. Though very young when these 
works appeared, Philippe exercised a considerable influence. 
Unfortimately some of that influence was toward decadence, 
for many of his disciples saw in him only superficial eccen- 
tricities of attitude and diction, and straightway developed 
those characteristics without t^ing into account his really 
valuable contributions to literature. 

Philippe was a naturalist in the same sense that Mau- 



xlii INTRODUCTION 

passant was, but to Maupassant's naturalism he added real- 
istic and psychological qualities which give to his work a 
brilliant color of truth. He waged an effective war against 
dilettanteism; he held ever before him an imbiased vision of 
actuality; there was in his writing no cultural pretaisions. 
Experience was the basis of his art; and his simple and 
straightforward style was such that he could vivify and 
project those experiences in the pages of his books. He was 
a serious artist, and recait French literature owes mudi both 
to his example and to his accomplishments. 



SOLANGE 

(Dr. Ledru's Story of the Reign of Terror) 
By ALEXANDRE DUMAS 

LEAVING TAbbaye, I walked straight across the Place 
Turenne to the Rue Toumon, where I had lodgings, 
when I heard a woman scream for help. 

It could not be an assault to commit robbery, for it was 
hardly ten o'clock in the evening. I ran to the comer of 
the place whence the sounds proceeded, and by the light of 
the moon, just then breaking through the clouds, I beheld a 
woman in the midst of a patrol of sans-culottes. 

The lady observed me at the same instant, and seeing, by 
the character of my dress, that I did not belong to the com- 
mon order of people, she ran toward me, exclaiming: 

"There is M. Albert! He knows mel He will tell you 
that I am the daughter of Mme. Ledieu, the laundress." 

With these words the poor creature, pale and trembling 
with excitement, seized my arm and clung to me as a ship- 
wrecked sailor to a spar. 

"No matter whether you are the daughter of Mme. Ledieu 
or some one else, as you have no pass, you must go with 
us to the guard-house." 

The young girl pressed my arm. I perceived in this 
pressiu-e the expression of her great distress of mind. I 
understood it. 

"So it is you, my poor Solange?" I said. "What are yoxi 
doing here?" 

"There, messieurs!" she exclaimed in tones of deep anx- 
iety; "do you believe me now?" 

Copyright, 1909, by Frank A. Munsey Company. 

I 



2 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"You might at least say 'citizens!' " 

"Ah, sergeant, do not blame me for ^)eaking that way/' 
said the pretty yoimg girl; "my mother has many customos 
among the great people, and taught me to be polite. Thafs 
how I acquired this bad habit — the habit of tihe aristocrats; 
and, you know, sergeant, it's so hard to shake off old 
habits!" 

This answer, delivered in trembling accents, concealed a 
delicate irony that was lost on all save mc. I asked mysdf, 
-who is this yovmg woman? The mystery seemed complete. 
This alone was clear, she was not the daughter of a laun- 
dress. 

"How did I come here, Citizen Albert?" she asked. 
"Well, I will tell you. I went to deliver some washing. The 
lady was not at home, and so I waited; for in these hard 
times every one needs what little money is coming to him. 
In that way it grew dark, and so I fell among these gentle- 
men — beg pardon, I would say citizens. They asked for my 
pass. As I did not have it with me, they were going to 
take me to the guard-house. I cried out in terror, which 
brought you to the scene; and as luck would have it, yovi 
are a friend. I said to myself, as M. Albert knows my 
name to be Solange Ledieu, he will vouch for me; and that 
you will, will you not, M. Albert?" 

"Certainly, I will vouch for you." 

"Very well," said the leader of the patrol; "and who, 
pray, will vouch for you, my friend?" 

"Danton! Do you know him? Is he a good patriot?" 

"Oh, if Danton will vouch for you, I have nothing to say." 

"Well, there is a session of the Cordeliers to-day. Let 
us go there." 

"Good," said the leader. "Citizens, let us go to the 
Cordeliers." 

The club of the Cordeliers met at the old C<wrdelier 
monastery in the Rue TObservance. We arrived there after 
scarce a minute's walk. At the door I tore a page from my 
note-book, wrote a few words upon it with a lead pencil, 
gave it to the sergeant, and requested him to hand it to 
Danton, while I waited outside with the men. 



ALEXANDRE DUMAS 3 

The sergeant entered the clubhouse and returned with 
Danton. 

"What!" said he to me; "they have arrested you, my 
friend? You, the friend of CamiUes — ^you, one of the most 
loyal republicans? Citizens," he continued, addressing the 
sergeant, "I vouch for him. Is that sufficient?" 

**You vouch for him. Do you also vouch for her?" asked 
the stubborn sergeant. 

"For her? To whom do you refer?" 

"This girl." 

"For everything; for everybody who may be in his com- 
pany. Does that satisfy you?" 

"Yes," said the man; "especially since I have had the 
privilege of seeing you." 

With a cheer for Danton, the patrol marched away. I 
was about to thank Danton, when his name was called re- 
peatedly within. 

"Pardon me, my friend," he said; "you hear? There is 
my hand; I must leave you — the left. I gave my right to 
the sergeant. Who knows, the good patriot may have 
scrofula?" 

"I'm coming!" he exclaimed, addressing those within in 
his mighty voice with which he could pacify or arouse the 
masses. He hastened into the house. 

I remained standing at the door, alone with my vmknown. 

"And now, my lady," I said, "whither would you have 
me escort you? I am at your disposal." 

"Why, to Mme. Ledieu," she said with a laugh. "I told 
you she was my mother." 

"And where does Mme. Ledieu reside?" 

"Rue Ferou, 24." 

"Then, let us' proceed to Rue Ferou, 24." 

On the way neither of us spoke a word. But by the light 
of the moon, enthroned in serene glory in the sky, I was 
able to observe her at my leisure. She was a charming 
girl of twenty or twenty-two — ^brunette, with large blue eyes, 
more expressive of intelligence than melancholy — a finely 
chiseled nose, mocking lips, teeth of p)earl, hands like a 
queen's, and feet like a child's; and all these, in spite of her 



4 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

costiune of a laundress, betokened an aristocratic air that 
had aroused the sergeant's suspicions not without justice. 

Arrived at the door of the house, we looked at each other 
a moment in silence. 

"Well, my dear M. Albert, what do you wish?" my fair 
tmknown asked with a smile. 

"I was about to say, my dear Mile. Solange, that it was 
hardly worth while to meet if we are to part so soon." 

"Oh, I beg ten thousand pardons! I find it was well 
worth the while; for if I had not met you, I should have been 
dragged to the guard-house, and there it would have been 
discovered that I am not the daughter of Mme. Ledieu — ^in 
fact, it would have developed that I am an aristocrat, and 
in all likelihood they would have cut off my head." 

"You admit, then, that you are an aristocrat?" 

"I admit nothing." 

"At least you might tell me your name." 

"Solange." 

"I know very well that this name, which I gave you on 
the inspiration of the moment, is not your ri^t name." 

"No matter; I like it, and I am going to keep it — at 
least for you." 

"Why should you keep it for me, if we are not to meet 
again?" 

"I did not say that. I only said that if we should meet 

again it will not be necessary for you to know my name 

N any more than that I should know yours. To me you 

will be known as Albert, and to you I shall always be 

Solange." 

"So be it, then; but I say, Solange," I began. 

"I am listening, Albert," she replied. 

"You are an aristocrat — that you admit." 

"If I did not admit it, you would surmise it, and so my 
admission would be divested of half its merit." 

"And you were pursued because you were suspected of 
being an aristocrat?" 

"I fear so." 

"And you are hiding to escape persecution?" 

"Im the Rue Ferou, No. 24, with Mme. Ledieu, whose 



ALEXANDRE DUMAS S 

husband was my father's coachman. You see, I have no 
secret from you." 

"And your father?" 

''I shall make no concealment, my dear Albert, of any- 
thing that relates to me. But my father's secrets are not 
my own. My father is in hiding, hoping to make his escape. 
That is all I can tell you." 

"And what are you going to do?" 

"Go with my father, if that be possible. If not, allow 
him to depart without me until the opportunity offers itsdf 
to me to join him." 

"Were you commg from your father when the guard ar- 
rested you to-ni^t?" 

"Yes." 

"Listen, dearest Solange." 

"I am all attention." 

"You observed all that took place to-night?" 

"Yes. I saw that you had powerful influence." 

"I regret my power is not very great. However, I have 
friends." 

"I made the acquaintance of one of them." 

"And you know he is not one of the least powerful men 
of the times." 

"Do you intend to enlist his influence to enable my father 
to escape?" 

"No, I reserve him for you." 
'But my father?" 

'I have other ways of helping your father." 

"Other ways?" exclaimed Solange, seizing my hands and 
studying me with an anxious expression. 

"If I serve your father, will you then sometimes think 
kindly of me?" 

"Oh, I shall all my life hold you in grateful remem- 
brance!" 

She uttered these words with an enchanting expression 
of devotion. Then she looked at me beseechingly and said: 

"But will that satisfy you?" 

"Yes," I said. 

"Ah, I was not mistaken. You are kind, generous. I 






6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

thank you for my father and myself. Even if you should 
fail, I shall be grateful for what you have already done I" 

"When shall we meet again, Solange?" 

"When do you think it necessary to see me again?" 

"To-morrow, when I hope to have good news for you." 

"Well, then, to-morrow." 

"Where?" 

"Here." 

"Here in the street?" 

"Well, mon Dieu!" she exclaimed. "You see, it is the 
safest place. For thirty minutes, while we have been talking 
here, not a soul has passed." 

"Why may I not go to you, or you come to me?" 

"Because it would compromise the good people if you 
should come to me, and you would incur serious risk if I 
should go to you." 

"Oh, I would give you the pass of one of my relatives." 

"And send your relative to the guillotine if I should be 
accidentally arrested!" 

"True. I will bring you a pass made out in the name 
of Solange." 

"Charming! You observe Solange is my real name." 

"And the hour?" 

"The same at which we met to-night — ten o'clock, if you 
please." 

"All right; ten o'clock. And how shall we meet?" 

"That is very simple. Be at the door at five minutes of 
ten, and at ten I will come down." 

''Then, at ten to-morrow, dear Solange." 

"To-morrow at ten, dear Albert." 

I wanted to kiss her hand; she offered me her brow. 

The next day I was in the street at half past nine. At a 
quarter of ten Solange opened the door. We were both 
ahead of time. 

With one leap I was by her side. 

"I see you have good news," she said. 

"Excellent! First, here is a pass for you." 

"First my father!" 

She repelled my hand. 



ALEXANDRE DUMAS 7 

"Your father is saved, if he wishes." 

"Wishes, you say? What is required of him?" 

"He must trust me." 

"That is assured." 

"Have you seen him?" 

"Yes." 

"You have discussed the situation with him?" 

"It was unavoidable. Heaven will help us." 

"Did you tell your father all?" 

"I told him you had saved my life yesterday, and that 
you would perhaps save his to-morrow." 

"To-morrow! Yes, quite right; to-morrow I shall save 
his life, if it is his will." 

"How? What? Speak! Speak! If that were possible, 
how fortunately all things have come to pass!" 

"However " I began hesitatingly. 

"WeU?" 

"It will be impossible for you to accompany him." 

"I told you I was resolute." 

"I am quite confident, however, that I shall be able laUr 
to procure a passport for you." 

"First tell me about my father; my own distress is lew 
important." 

"Well, I told you I had friends, did I not?" 

"Yes." 

"To-day I sought out one of them." 

"Proceed." 

"A man whose name is familiar to you; whose name b 
a guarantee of courage and honour." 

"And this man is?" 

"Marceau." 

"General Marceau?" 

"Yes." 

"True, he will keep a promise." 

"Well, he has promised." 

"Mon Dieu! How happy you make mel What has he 
promised? Tell me all." 

"He has promised to help us." 

"In what manner?" 



8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"In a very simple maimer. K16ber has just had him 
promoted to tile command of the western army. He departs 
to-morrow night." 

'To-morrow ni^t! We shall have no time to make 
the smallest preparation." 

"There are no preparations to make." 

"I do not xmderstand." 

"He will take your father with him." 

"My father?" 

"Yes, as his secretary. Arrived in the Vendue, your 
father will pledge his word to the general to undertake noth- 
ing against France. From there he will escape to Brittany, 
and from Brittany to England. When he arrives in London, 
he will inform you; I shall obtain a passport for you, and 
you will join him in London." 

"To-morrow," exclaimed Solange; "my father departs 
to-morrow!" 

"There is no time to waste." 

"My father has not been informed." 

"Inform him." 

"To-night?" 

"To-nigjit." 

"But how, at this hour?" 

"You have a pass and my arm." 

"True. My pass." 

I gave it to her. She thrust it into her bosom. 

"Now, your arm." 

I gave her my arm, and we walked away. When we ar- 
rived at the Place Turenne — that is, the spot where we had 
met the night before — she said: "Await me here." 

I bowed and waited. 

She disappeared aroxmd the comer of what was formerly 
the Hotel Malignon. After a lapse of fifteeiv minutes sl:^ 
returned. 

"Come," she said, "my father wishes to receive and 
thank you." 

Sie took my arm and led me up to the Rue St. Guil- 
laume, opposite the Hotel Mortemart. Ar'^'ved here, she 
took a bunch of keys from her pocket, opened a small, con- 



ALEXANDRE DUMAS 9 

cealed door, took me by the hand, conducted me up two 
flights of steps, and knodked m a peculiar manner. 

A man of forty-eight or fifty years opened the door. He 
was dressed as a working man and appeared to be a book- 
binder. But at the first utterance that burst from his lips, 
the evidence of the seigneur was immistakable. 

"Monsieur," he said, "Providence has sent you to us. I 
regard you an emissary of fate. Is it true that you can save 
me, or, what is more, that you wish to save me?" 

I admitted him completely to my confidence. I informed 
him that Marceau would take him as his secretary, and woiild 
exact no promise other than that he would not take up arms 
against France. 

"I cheerfully promise it now, and will repeat it to him." 

"I thank you in his name as well as in my own." 

"But when does Marceau depart?" 

"To-morrow." 

"Shall I go to him to-night? 

"Whenever you please; he expects you." 

Father and daughter looked at each other. 

"I think it would be wise to go this very night," said 
Solange. 

"I am ready; but if I should be arrested, seeing that I 
have no permit?" 

"Here is mine." 

"But you?" 

"Oh, I am known." 

"Where does Marceau reside?" 

"Rue de TUniversit^, 40, with his aster. Mile. D^graviers- 
Marceau." 

"Will you accompany me?" 

"I shall follow you at a distance, to accompany made- 
moiselle home when you are gone." 

"How will Marceau know that I am the man of whom 
you spoke to him?" 

"You will hand him this tri-colored cockade; that is the 
sign of identification." 

"And how shall I reward my liberator?" 

^By allowing him to save your daughter also." 



10 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Very well." 

He put on his hat and extinguished the lights, and y/m 
descended by the gleam of the moon which penetrated the 
stair-wmdows. 

At the foot of the steps he took his daughter's arm, and 
by way of the Rue des Saints Peres we reached Rue dc 
rUniversit6. I followed them at a distance of ten paces. 
We arrived at No. 40 without having met any one. I re- 
joined them there. 

"That is a good omen," I said; "do you wish me to gD 
up with you?" 

"No. Do not compromise yourself any further. Await 
my daughter here." 

I bowed. 

"And now, once more, thanks and farewell," he said, 
giving me his hand. "Language has no words to express 
my gratitude. I pray that heaven may some day grant me 
the opportunity of givmg fuller expression to my feelings." 

I answered him with a pressure of the hand. 

He entered the house. Solange followed him; but she, 
too, pressed my hand before she entered. 

In ten minutes the door was reonened. 

"Well?" I asked. 

"Your friend," she said, "is worthy of his name; he is as 
kind and considerate as yourself. He knows that it will 
contribute to my happiness to remain with my father until 
the moment of departure. His sister has ordered a bed 
placed in her room. To-morrow at three o'clock my father 
will be out of danger. To-morrow evening at ten I shall 
expect you in the Rue Ferou, if the gratitude of a daughter 
who owes her father's life to you is worth the trouble." 

"Oh, be sure I shall come. Did your father charge you 
with any message for me?" 

"He thanks you for your pass, which he returns to 3rou, 
and begs you to join him as soon as possible." 

"Whenever it may be your desire to go," I sdd, with a 
strange sensation at my heart. 

"At least, I must know where I am to join him," she said 
"Ah, you are not yet rid of mel" 



: ALEXANDRE DUMAS ii 

I seized her hand and pressed it against my heart, but she 
' \ offered me her brow, as on the previous evening, and said: 
. "Untfl to-morrow." 

I kissed her on the brow; but now I no longer strained 
\ \ her head against my breast, but her heaving bosom, her 
I throbbing heart. 

I I went home in a state of delirious ecstasy such as I had 
j never e^^rienced. Was it the consciousness of a generous 
j action, or was it love for this adorable creature? I know 
; not whether I slept or woke. I only know that all the 
harmonies of nature were singing within me; that the night 
, seemed endless, and the day eternal; I know that though 
. I wished to speed the time, I did not wish to lose a moment 
! of the days still to come. 

' The next day I was in the Rue Ferou at nine o'clock. At 
• half-past nine Solange made her appearance. 
J She approached me and threw her arms around my neck. 
\ "Saved!" she said; "my father is saved! And this I owe 
I you. Oh, how I love you!" 

Two weeks later Solange received a letter announcing 
her father's safe arrival in England. 
The next day I brought her a passport. 
When Solange received it she burst into tears. 
"You do not love me!" she exclaimed. 
"I love you better than my life," I replied ;*"but I pledged 
your father my word, and I must keep it." 

"Then, I will break mine," she said. "Yes, Albert; if 
you have the heart to let me go, I have not the courage to 
leave you." 
Alas, she remained! 

Three months had passed since that night on which we 
talked of her escape, and in all that time not a word of part- 
ing had passed her lips. 

Solange had taken lodgings in the Rue Turenne. I had 
rented them in her name. I knew no other, while she always 
addressed me as Albert. I had foxmd her a place as teacher 
in a young ladies' seminary solely to wiflidraw her from the 
espionage of the revolutionary police, which had become 
more scrutinizing than ever. 



12 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Sundays we passed together in the small dwdlmg, from 
the bedroom of which we could see the spot where we had 
first met. We exchanged letters daily, she writing to m 
under the name of Solange, and I to her under that of 
Albert. 

Those three months were the happiest of my life. 

In the meantime I was making some interesting esperi- 
ments suggested by one of the guillotiniers. I had obtiuned 
permission to make certain scientific tests with the bodies 
and heads of those who perished on the scaffold. Sad to 
say, available subjects were not wanting. Not a day passed 
but thirty or forty persons were guillotined, and blood flowed 
so copiously on the Place de la Revolution that it became 
necessary to dig a trench three feet deep around the scaffold- 
ing. This trench was covered with deals. One « of them 
loosened under the feet of an eight-year-old lad, who fdl 
into the abominable pit and was drowned. 

For ^If-evident reasons I said nothing to Solange of the 
studies that occupied my attention during the day. In the 
beginning my occupation had inspired me with pity and 
loathing, but as time wore on I said: "These studies are for 
the good of humanity," for I hoped to convmce the law- 
makers of the wisdom of abolishing capital punishment 

The Cemetery of Clamart had been assigned to me, and 
all the heads and trunks of the victims of the executioner 
had been placed at my disposal. A small chapel in one 
comer of the cemetery had been converted into a kind of 
laboratory for my benefit. You know, when the queens 
were driven from the palaces, God was banished from the 
churches. 

Every day at six the horrible procession filed in. The 
bodies were heaped together in a wagon, the heads in a sack. 
I chose some bodies and heads in a haphazard fashion, whfle 
the remainder were thrown into a common grave. 

In the midst of this occupation with the dead, my love 
for Solange increased from day to day; while the poor child 
reciprocated my affection with the whole power of her pure 
sold. 

Often I had thought of makmg her my wife; often wt 



ALEXANDRE DUMAS 13 



t 

) 

\ had mutuaDy pictured to ourselves the happiness of such a 

\ uni(m. But in order to become my wife, it would be neces- 

saiy for Solange to reveal her name; and this name, which 

[ was that of an emigrant, an aristocrat, meant death. 

\ Her father had repeatedly urged her by letter to hasten 

' her departure, but she had informed him of our engagement. 

She had requested his consent, and he had given it, so that 

«9 had gone well to this extent. 

The trial and execution of the queen, Marie Antoinette, 
bad plunged me, too, into deepest sadness. Solange was all 
tears, and we could not rid ourselves of a strange feeling of 
de^x)ndency, a presentiment of approaching danger, that 
compressed our hearts. In vam I tried to whisper courage 
to Solange. Weeping, she reclined in my arms, and I could 
not comfort her, because my own words lacked the ring of 
confidence. 

We passed the night together as usual, but the night was 
even more depressing than the day. I recall now that a dog, 
locked up in a room below us, howled till two o'clock in the 
morning. The next day we were told that the dog's master 
had gone away with the key in his pocket, had been arrested 
on the way, tried at three, and executed at four. 

The time had come for us to part. Solange's duties at the 
school began at nine o'clock in the morning. Her school 
was in the vicinity of the Botanic Gardens. I hesitated IcHig 
to let her go; she, too, was loath to part from me. But it 
must be. Solange was prone to be an object of unpleasant 
inquiries. 

I called a conveyance and accompanied her as far as the 
Rue des Fosses-Saint-Bemard, where I got out and left her 
to pursue her way alone. All the way we lay mutely 
wrapped in each other's arms, mingling tears with our kisses. 

After leaving the carriage, I stood as if rooted to the 
ground. I heard Solange call me, but I dared not go to her, 
because her face, moist with tears, and her hysterical manner 
were calculated to attract attention. 

Utterly wretched, I returned home, passing the entire day 
in writing to Solange. In the evening I sent her an entire 
volume of love-pledges. 



14 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

My letter had hardly gone to the post when I received 
one from her. 

She had been sharply reprimanded for coming late; had 
been subjected to a severe cross-exammation, and threatened 
with forfeiture of her next holiday. But she vowed to join 
me even at the cost of her place. I thought I shoiild go 
mad at the prospect of being parted from her a whole wedL 
I was more depressed because a letter which had arrived 
from her father appeared to have been tampered with. 

I passed a wretched night and a still more miserable day. 

The next day the weather was appalling. Natiu-e seemed 
to be dissolving in a cold, ceaseless rain — a rain like that 
which annoimces the approach of winter. All the way to 
the laboratory my ears were tortured with the criers an- 
noimcing the names of the condemned, a large number of 
men, women, and children. The bloody harvest was ov«r- 
rich. I should not lack subjects for my investigations that 
day. 

The day ended early. At four o'clock I arrived at Clam- 
art; it was almost night. 

The view of the cemetery, with its large, new-made graves; 
the sparse, leafless trees that swayed in the wind, was deso- 
late, almost appalling. 

A large, open pit yawned before me. It was to receive 
to-day*s harvest from the Place de la Revolution. An ex- 
ceedingly large number of victims was expected, for the fit 
was deeper tihan usual. 

Mechanically I approached the grave. At the bottom the 
water had gathered in a pool; my feet slipped; I came within 
an inch of falling in. My hair stood on end. The rain had 
drenched me to the skin. I shuddered and hastened into 
the laboratory. 

It was, as I have said, an abandoned chapel. My eyes 
searched — I know not why — to discover if some traces of the 
holy purpose to which the edifice had once been devoted 
did not still adhere to the walls or to the altar; but the walls 
were bare, the altar empty. 

I struck a light and deposited the candle on the operat- 
ing-table on which lay scattered a miscellaneous assortment 



ALEXANDRE DUMAS 15 

of the strange instruments I employed. I sat down and fell 
into a reverie. I thought of the poor queen, whom I had 
seen in her beauty, glory, and happiness, yesterday carted to 
the scaffold, pursued by the execrations of a people, to-day 
lying headless on the common sinners' bier — she who had 
dept beneath the gilded canopy of the throne of the Tuileries 
and St. Cloud. 

As I sat thus, absorbed in gloomy meditation, wind and 
rain without redoubled in fiuy. The rain-drops dashed 
against the window-panes, the storm swept with melancholy 
moaning through the branches of the trees. Anon there 
mingled with the violence of the elements the soxmd of 
wheels. 

It was the executioner's red hearse with its ghastly freight 
from the Place de la Revolution. 

The door of the little chapel was pushed ajar, and two 
men, drenched with rain, entered, carrying a sack between 
them. 

"There, M. Ledru," said the guillotinier; "there is what 
your heart longs for! Be in no hurry this night! Well 
leave you to enjoy their society alone. Orders are not to 
cover them up till to-morrow, and so they'll not take cold." 

With a horrible laugh, the two executioners deposited the 
sack in a comer, near the former altar, right in front of me. 
Thereupon they sauntered out, leaving open the door, which 
swimg furiously on its hinges till my candle flashed and 
flared in the fierce draft. 

I heard them unharness the horse, lock the cemetery, and 
go away. 

I was strangely impelled to go with them, but an in- 
definable power fettered me in my place. I could not repress 
a shudder. I had no fear; but the violence of, the storm, the 
splashing of the rain, the whistling sounds of the lashing 
branches, the shrill vibration of the atmosphere, which made 
my candle tremble — ^all this filled me with a vague terror 
that began at the roots of my hair and communicated itself 
to every part of my body. 

Suddet^y I fancied I heard a voice! A voice at once soft 



x6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

and plaintive; a voice within the cfaapd, {xonoimdng the 
name of "Albert!" 

I was startled. 

"Albert!" 

But one person in all the worid addressed me by fhat 
name! 

Slowly I directed my weeping eyes aromid the chapd, 
which, though small, was not completely lifted by the 
feeble rays of the candle, leaving the nooks and an^es in 
darkness, and my look remained fixed on the blood-soaked 
sack near the altar with its hideous contents. 

At this moment the same voice repeated the same name, 
only it sounded fainter and more plaintive. 

"Albert!" 

I bolted out of my chair, frozen with horror. 

The voice seemed to proceed from the sack! 

I touched myself to make sure that I was awake; then I 
walked toward the sack with my arms extended before me, 
but stark and staring with horror. I thrust my hand into 
it. Then it seemed to me as if two lips, still warm, pressed 
a kiss upon my fingers! 

I had reached that stage of boundless terror where the 
excess of fear turns into the audacity of dei^ir. I seized 
the head and, collapsing in my chair, placed it in front of me. 

Then I gave vent to a fearful scream. This head, with its 
its lips still warm, with eyes half closed, was the head of 
Solange! 

I thought I should go mad. 

Three times I called: 

"Solange ! Solange ! Solange ! " 

At the third time she opened her eyes and looked at me 
Tears trickled down her cheeks; then a moist blow darted 
from her eyes, as if the soul were passing, and the eyes 
dosed, never to open again. 

I sprang to my feet a raving maniac. I wanted to fly; I 
knocked against the table; it fell. The candle was extin- 
guished; the head rolled upon the floor, and I fell prostrate, 
as if a terrible fever had stricken me down — an icy shudder 
convulsed me, and, with a deep sigh, I swooned. 



ALEXANDRE DUMAS 17 

The following moming at six the grave-diggers found me^ 
cold as the flagstones on which I lay. 

Solange, betrayed by her father's letter, had been arrested 
the same day, condemned, and executed. 

Tlie head that had called me, the eyes that had looked at 
me, were the head, the eyes, of Solangel 



NAPOLEON AND POPE PIUS VII 

(From La Canne de J one) 
By ALFRED DE VIGNY 

WE were at Fontainebleau. The Pope had just ar- 
rived. The Emperor had awaited him with great im- 
patience, as he desired the Holy Father to crown him. 
Napoleon received him in person, and thej immediately 
entered the carriage on opposite sides, at the same time 
apparently with an entire neglect of etiquette, but this was 
only in appearance, for the movement was thoroughly cal- 
culated. It was so arranged that neither might seem to 
3deld precedence or to exact it from the other. The ruse 
was characteristically Italian. They at once drove towards 
the palace, where all kinds of rumors were in circulation. 
I had left several officers in the room which preceded that 
of the Emperor; and I was quite alone in his apartment 
I was standing looking at a long table, which was of 
Roman mosaic work» and which was absolutely loaded, cov- 
ered with heaps of papers. I had often seen Napoleon 
enter, and submit the pile of documents to a strange system 
of decision* He did not take the letters either by hazard or 
in order; but when the number irritated him, he swq)l 
them off the table with his hand — striking right and left like 
a mower, until he had reduced the number to six or seven, 
which he opened. Such disdainful conduct had moved- me 
singularly. So many letters of distress and mourning caal 
underfoot as if by an angry wind; so many useless prayers 
of widows and orphans having no chance except that of 
being spared by the consular hand; so many groaning 

Translated by J. Matthewman. Copyright, 1896, by The Cur- 
rent Literature Publishing Company. 

18 



ALFRED DE VIGNY 19 

leaves, moistened by the tears of so many families, trampled 
under his heel with as little compimction as if they were 
corpses on a battlefield — all these seemed to represent the 
fate of France. Althou^ the hand that acted so ruthlessly 
was strong, it seemed always that such brut^^ strength was 
anything but admirable, and it seemed wrong that so much 
should be left to the caprice of such a man. Moreover, 
had a little consideration been shown, Napoleon would have 
had so many more buttresses for his power and authority. 
I felt my heart rise against the man — ^but feebly, like the 
heart of one who was his slave. I thought of the letters 
which had been treated with such cruel contempt; cries 
of anguish came from the envelopes; and having read some 
of the petitions I constituted myself judge between the 
man and those who had sacrificed themselves so much for 
him, upon whose necks he was going to fasten the yoke 
tighter that very day. I was holding one of the papers 
in my hand, when the beating of the drums informed me of 
the arrival of Napoleon. Now you know that just as 
one alwa3rs sees the flash from a cannon before one hears 
the report, one always saw him as he was heard to be 
approaching; he was so active, and seemed to have so little 
time. When he rode into the courtyard of the palace, 
his attendants were scarcely able to keep up with him. 
The sentry had barely time to salute before the Emperor 
had got down from his horse and was hurrying up the 
staircase. This time he had left the Pope in the carriage 
in order to be able to enter the palace alone, and had 
galloped on ahead. I heard the sound of his spurs at the 
same time as the drums. I had only just time enough to 
throw myself into an alcove where there was an old- 
fashioned high bedstead which was used by no one, and 
which was, fortunately, concealed by curtains. 

The Emperor was in a state of great excitement, and 
strode about the room as if waiting for some one with great 
impatience. Having darted across the room several times, 
he went to the window and began to drum on the panes. 
A carriage rolled into the court; he ceased beating a tattoo 
on ihe glass, and stamped with his foot as if the sight which 



20 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

he saw in the courtyard was an3rthmg but agreeable to him. 
Then he tore across the room to the door, which he opened 
for the Pope. 

Pius VII entered unattended. Bons^arte hastily dosed 
the door after the old man with the care of a jailer. I 
will confess that I was in a state of mortal terror at being 
the third of the party. However, I remained motionless, 
listening eagerly to every word that was said. 

The Pope was tall; his face was long, yellow, and had 
traces of great suffering, but bore the imprint of a good- 
ness of soul and nobility of spirit which knew no bounds. 
He had fine, big, black eyes, and his mouth was sweetened 
by a smile whidi lent something spirituelle and vivacious 
to his countenance. It was a smile in which one could 
detect nothing of the ciuming of the world, but which was 
full to overflowing of Christian goodness. On his head 
he wore a skull cap, from under which escaped locks of 
his silver-streaked hair. A red velvet cloak hung negli- 
gently on his stooping shoulders, and his robe dn^ed at 
his feet. He entered slowly, with the calm and prudent step 
of an aged man, sank down into one of the big Roman 
armchairs, which were gilded and covered with eagles, 
lowered his eyes, and waited to hear what the other Italian 
had to say to him. 

What a scene that was! I can see it still. It was not 
the genius of the man which I noticed, but his character. 
Bonaparte was not then as you knew him afterward; he 
had not grown gross — ^he had not the swollen face, the 
gouty legs, nor was he so ridiculously stout as he after- 
wards became. Unfortunately, in art he is almost always 
represented by a sort of caricature, so that he will not be 
handed down to posterity as he really was. He was not 
ungainly then, but nervous and supple, lithe and active, 
convulsive in some of his gestures, in some gracious; his 
chest was flat and narrow — in short, he looked just as I 
had seen him at Malta. 

He did not stop stalking round the room when the Pope 
entered. He wandered round the chair of the latter like 
a cautious himter; then suddenly halting in front of Fius^ 



ALFRED DE VIGNY 21 

he resumed a conversation which had been commenced in 
the carriage, and \vhich he was evidently anxious to continue. 

^'I tell you again. Holy Father, I am not a free-thinker; 
and I don't agree with those who are forever reasoning 
about religious matters. I assure you that in spite of my 
old republicans I shall go to mass." 

The last words he threw bruskly, as it were, in the Pope's 
face — incense of flattery undisguised. Then he suddenly 
stopped and examined the Pope's countenance to catch the 
result, which he seemed to expect to be great The old 
man lowered his eyes and rested his hands on the heads of 
the eagles which formed the arms of the chair. He seemed 
to have assimied the attitude of a Roman statue purposely, 
as if wishing to express: I resign myself to hearing all the 
profane things that he may choose to say to me! 

Bon£^>arte took a turn roimd the room, and round the 
chair which was in the middle, and it was plain to be 
seen that he was not satisfied either with himself or with 
his adversary, and that he was r^roaching himself for 
having resumed the conversation so rashly. So he began 
to talk more connectedly as he walked round the room, 
all the time watching narrowly the reflection of the pon- 
tiff's face in the mirror, and also eyeing him carefully in 
profile as he passed; but not ventiuing to look him full in 
the face for fear of appearing too anxious about the effect 
of his words. 

"There is one thing that hurts me very much, Holy 
Father," said he, "and that is that you consent to the coro- 
nation as you formerly consented to the Concordat — as if 
you were compelled to do so, and not as of free will. You 
sit there before me with the air of a mart3n*, resigned to 
the will of heaven, and suffering for the sake of yoiur con- 
science. But that is not the fact. You are not a pris- 
oner. You are as free as the air." 

Pius VII smiled and looked his interlocutor in the face. 
He realized that the despotic nature with which he had to 
contend was not satisfied with obedience unless one seemed 
"mlling, even anxious, to obey. 

"Yes," continued Bonaparte, "you are quite free. You 



22 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

may return to Rome if you like. The road is open and 
no one will stop you." 

Without uttering a word, the Pope sighed and rsused his 
hand and his eyes to heaven; then very slowly he lowered 
his eyes and studied the cross on his bosom attentively. 

Bonaparte continued to walk round the room and ^ to 
talk to his captive, his voice becoming sweeter and more 
wheedling. 

"Holy Father, were it not for the reverence I have for 
you I should be inclined to say that you are a little un- 
grateful. You seem to ignore entirely the services which 
France has rendered you. As far as I am able to judge, the 
Coimcil of Venice, which elected you Pope, was influenced 
somewhat by my campaign in Italy, as well as by a word 
which I spoke for you. I was very much troubled at the 
time that Austria treated you so badly. I believe that 
your Holiness was obliged to return to Rome by sea for 
fear of passing through Austrian territory." 

He stopped for the answer of his silent guest; Pius VII 
madp simply the slightest inclination of the head, and 
remained plunged in a melancholy reverie which seemed to 
prevent him from hearing Napoleon. 

Bonaparte then pushed a chair near to that of the Pope. 
I started, for in seeking the chair he had come very near 
my hiding-place, he even brushed the curtains whidi con- 
cealed me. 

"It was as a Catholic really that I was so afflicted about 
your vexations. I have never had much time to study 
theology, it is true, but I maintain a great faith in the 
Church. She has a wonderful vitality. Holy Father, al- 
though Voltaire did you some little harm, certainly. Now 
if you are only willing we can do a great deal of work 
together in the future." 

He assumed a caressing, wheedling air of innocence. 

"Really, I have tried to understand your motives, but 
I can't for the life of me see what objection you can have 
to making Paris your seat. Ill leave the Tuileries to you 
if you like. You'll find your room waitmg for you there. 
I scarcely ever go there myself. Don't you see, FaAer, 



ALFRED DE VIGNY 23 

it is the capital of the wox\A. Ill do i;irhatever you want 
me to; and really, after all, I am not as bad as I am 
painted. If you'U leave war and politics to me you may 
do as you like in ecclesiastical matters. In fact, I would 
be your soldier. Now wouldn't that be a grand arrange- 
ment? We could hold our councils like Constantine and 
Charlemagne — I would open and dissolve them; and then I 
-would put the keys of the world into your hands, for as 
our Lord said: 'I came with a sword/ and I would keep 
the sword; I would only bring it to you for yoiur blessing 
after each new success of our arms." 

The Pope, who until then had remained as motionless 
as an Egyptian statue, slowly raised his head, smiled sadly, 
lifted his eyes to heaven, and said, after a gentle sigh, as if 
he were confiiding the thought to his invisible guardian 
angd: 

"Commediantel" 

Napoleon leaped from his chair like a wounded tiger. 
He was in one of his "yellow tempers." At first he stamped 
about without uttering a word, biting his lips till the blood 
came. He no longer circled roimd his prey cautiously, 
but walked from end to end of the room with firm resoimd- 
ing steps, and clinking his spurs noisily. The room shook; 
the curtains trembled like trees at the approach of a storm; 
I thought that something terrible would surely happen; 
my hair began to bristle, and I put my hand to my head 
unwittingly. I looked at the Pope. He did not stir, but 
simply pressed the heads of the eagles with his hands. 

The storm burst violently. 

"Comedian! What? I, a comedian? Indeed, 111 play 
some comedies for you that will set you all a-weeping like 
women and children! Comedian, forsooth! You are mis- 
taken if you think that you may insult me with impunity. 
My theatre is the world: the role that I play is the double 
one of master and actor; I use all of you as comedians, 
popes, kings, peoples, and the string by which I work you 
— you my puppets — is fear. You would need to be a much 
heavier man than you are, Signor Chiaramonti, to dare to 
aiq>laud or hiss me. Do you know that if it be my will 



24 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

you wOl become a simple curi? As for you and your tiara, 
France would mock at you if I did not seem to be serious 
in saluting you. 

''Only four years ago nobody dared speak of ChrisL 
Had that state of things continued who would have cared 
for the Pope, I should like to know? Comedian 1 You 
gentlemen are a little too ready at getting a foothold among 
us. And now you are dissatisfied because I am not such 
a fool as to sign away the liberties of France as did Louis 
XIV. But you had better not sing to me in that tune. 
It is I who hold you between my thumb and finger; it is I 
who can carry you from north to south and then back 
again to the north like so many marionettes; it is I who 
give you some stability because you represent an old idea 
which I wish to resuscitate; and you have not enough wit 
to see that, and to act as if you were not aware of the fact 
Now ni speak to you frankly. Trouble your head with 
your own affairs and don't interfere in what you don't un- 
derstand and with what doesn't in the least concern you. 
You seem to think that you are necessary, you set your- 
selves up as if you were of some weight, and you dress 
yourselves in women's clothes. But 111 let you know that 
you don't impose on me with all that; and if you don't 
change your tactics very soon I'll treat your robes as 
Charles XII did that of the Grand Vizier— 111 tear them 
with my spin-." 

Then he ceased. I scarcely dared breathe. I advanced 
my head a little, not hearing his voice, to see if the poor 
old priest was dead with fright. The same absolutely calm 
attitude, the same calm expression on his face. For the 
second time he raised his eyes to heaven, again he sig^ied, 
and smiled bitterly as he murmured: 

"Tragediante!" 

Bonaparte was at the farther end of the room, leaidng 
against a marble chimney which was as high as he was taD. 
Like an arrow shot out of a bow, he rushed strai^t at the 
old man; I thought he was going to kill him as he sat 
But he suddenly stopped short, seized a Sevres vaae oa 
which the Capitol was painted, threw it on the hearth and 



ALFRED DE VIGNY 25 

ground it under his heels. Then he remained terribly quiet. 

I was relieved, for I fdt that his reason had got the bet- 
ter of his temper. He became sad, and when he finally 
^x)ke in a deep voice, it was evident that in the two words 
uttered by the Pope he had recognized his true portrait 

"Miserable life!" he said. Then he fell into reverie, and 
without speaking tore the brim of his hat. When his 
voice again was heard he was talking to himself: 

"It's true. Tragedian or comedian, I am always play- 
ing a part — all is costume and pose. How wearying it all 
is, and how belittling! Pose! pose! always pose! In one 
case full face, in another profile — but invariably for effect. 
Always trying to appear what others worship, so that I 
may deceive the fools, keeping them between hope and 
fear. Dazzling them by bulletins, by prestige. Master of 
all of them and not knowing what to do with them. That's 
the simple truth after all. And to make myself so miser- 
able through it all! It really is too much. For," con- 
tinued he, sitting down in an armchair and crossing his legs, 
"it bores me to death, the whole farce. As soon as I sit 
down I don't know what to do with myself. I can't even 
hunt for three days in succession at Fontainebleau with 
being weary of it. I must always be moving and making 
others move. I speak quite frankly. I have plans in my 
life which would require the lives of forty emperors to 
carry out, and I make new ones every morning and evening; 
my imagination is always on the qui vive; but before I have 
carried out two of them I shall be exhausted in body and 
mind; for our poor lamp of life doesn't bum long enough. 
And I must confess that if I could carry them out I should 
not find that the world was one whit better than it is now; 
but it would be better though, for it would be united. I 
am not a philosopher. I don't understand many theories. 
Life is too short to stop. As soon as I have an idea I put 
it into execution. Others will find reasons after me for 
praising me if I succeed and for abusing me if I fail. Dif- 
ferences of opinion are active — they abound in France — 
but I keep them down while I am alive — afterward — Well, 
no matterl It is my business to succeed, and that I intend 



26 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

to do. Every day I make an Hiad by my actions — every 
day." 

Thereupon he rose quickly. In that moment he was 
lively and natural, and was not thinking of posing as he 
afterward did in St. Helena; he did not strive to make 
himself ideal or to pose for effect — ^he was himself outside 
of himself. He went back to the Pope, who had remained 
seated, and paced in front of him. Getting warmed up, 
he spoke with a dash of irony, at an incredible rate: 

"Birth is everything. Those who come into the world 
poor and neglected are always desperate. That desperation 
turns to action or suicide according to character. When 
they have courage to attempt something as I have done, 
they raise the devO. But what else is to be done? One 
must live. One must find one's place and make one's 
mark. I have carried everything before me like a cannon- 
ball — all the worse for those who happened to be in my 
way. But what else could I have done? Each man eats 
according to his appetite, and I have an insatiable one. Do 
you know. Holy Father, at Toulon I had not wherewithal 
to buy myself a pair of epaulets, in place of which I had 
a mother and I don't know how many brothers on my 
shoulders. They are all satisfactorily settled at present 
Josephine married me out of pity in spite of her old notary, 
who objected that I owned nothing but my cap and cape, 
and now we are going to crown her. The old man was 
right, though, as to what I possessed at that time. Imperial 
mantJe! Crown! what does all that mean? Is it mine? 
Costume! Actor's costume! I will put them on for an 
hour and then I shall have had enough of them. Then I 
shall don my officer's imiform, and To horse'; all my life 
on horseback. I couldn't pass a single day resting, without 
being in danger of falling out of the chair. I am to be 
envied? Eh? 

"I repeat, Holy Father; there are only two classes of 
men in the world: those who have and those who gain. 

"Those who are in the first class rest, the others ane rest- 
less. As I learnt that lesson at an early age and to some 
purpose I shall go a long way. There are only two men 



ALFRED DE VIGNY 27 

vAo have done anything before they were forty years old; 
Cromwell and Jean- Jacques; if you had given one a farm, 
and the other twelve hundred francs and his servant, they 
would neither have commanded nor preached nor written. 
There are workmen in buildings, in colors, in forms, and 
in phrases: I am a workman in battles. It's my business. 
At the age of thirty-five I have manufactured eighteen of 
them, which are called * Victories.' I must be paid for my 
work. And a throne is certainly not extravagant pa3mtient 
Besides, I shall always go on working. You will see that 
aU dynasties will date from mine, although I am a mere 
parvenu. I am elected as you are. Holy Father — and 
drawn from the multitude. On this point we can well shake 
hands." 

And, approaching the Pope, Napoleon held out his hand. 
Pius took the hand which was offered to him, but shook 
his head sadly, and I saw his fine eyes cloud with tears. 

Bonaparte cast a hurried glance at the tears which he 
had wrung from the old Pope, and I surprised even a rapid 
motion in the comers of his mouth much resembling a smile 
of triimiph. At that moment his intensely powerful and 
overbearing nature seemed to me less admirable than that 
of his saintly adversary; I blushed for all my past admira- 
tion of Napoleon; I felt a sadness creep over me at the 
thought that the grandest policy appears little when stained 
by tricks of vanity. I saw that the emperor had gained his 
end in the interview by having yielded nothing and by 
having drawn a sign of weakness from the Pope. He had 
wished to have the last word, and without uttering another 
syllable, he left the room as abruptly as he had entered. 
I could not see whether he saluted the Pope or not, but I 
do not think he did. 



CROISILLES 

(CroisiUes) 
By ALFRED DE MUSSET 



AT the b^iiming of the reign of Locds XV., a young 
man named CroisQles, son of a goldsmith, vns le- 
tuming from Paris to Havre, his native town. He 
had been intrusted by his father with the transaction 
of some business, and his trip to the great dty hav- 
ing tmned out satisfactorily, the joy of bringing good 
news caused him to walk the sixty leagues more gaily 
and briskly than his wont; for, thwg^ he had a rather 
large sum of money in his pocket he travelled on foot 
for pleasure. He was a good-tax^)ered fellow, and not 
without wit, but so \*ery thou^Uess and flij^ty that 
people looked upon him as being rather weak-minded. Hb 
doublet buttoned awry, his periwig flying to the wind, his 
hat under his arm, he followed the banks of the Seine, at 
times finding enjox-ment in his own thoughts and again in- 
dulging in snatdies of song: up at daybreak, siqiping at 
wa>'side inns, and alwa\*s charmed with this strdl of his 
tfarou^ one of the most beautiful rtgtoiDs of France. Fhm- 
dering the apple-trees of Nonnandy on his way, he puaded 
hb brain to find rfa>ines (for all these rattle^tes are more 
or less poets), and tried hard to turn out a madrigal for 
a certain fair damsd of his native place. She was no less 
than a dau^ter of a fermkr-gimird^ Mademoisdle Godean, 
the pearl of Havre, a rich heiress, and modi courted. Ckoi- 
silles was not rKd>^ at M. Godean'^ otbeniise than in a 
casual sort of way, that is to sqr> he Ittd ^'^n^u^i^n Umidf 
Coprright. 1888; ^ BrartanoV 

18 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 29 

taken there articles of jewelry purchased at his father's. 
M. Godeau, whose somewhat vtilgar surname ill-fitted his 
immense fortime, avenged himself by his arrogance for the 
stigma of his birth, and showed himself on all occasions enor- 
mously and pitilessly rich. He certainly was not the man 
to allow the son of a goldsmith to enter his drawing-room; 
but, as Madanoiselle Godeau had the most beautifui eves 
in the world, and Croisilles was not ill-favoured; and as 
nothing can prevent a fine fellow from falling in love with 
a pretty girl, Croisilles adored Mademoiselle Godeau, who 
did not seem vexed thereat. Thus was he thinking of her 
as he turned his steps toward Havre; and, as he had never 
reflected seriously upon an3^ing, instead of thinking of the 
invincible obstacles which separated him from his lady-love, 
he busied himself only with fading a rhyme for the Christian 
name she bore. Mademoiselle Godeau was called Juli^ and 
the rhyme was found easily enough. So Croisilles, having 
reached Honfleiu*, embarked with a satisfied heart, his 
money and his madrigal in his pocket, and as soon as he 
jumped ashore ran to the paternal house. 

He foimd the shop closed, and knocked again and again, 
not without the astonishment and apprehension, for it was 
not a holiday; but nobody came. He called his father, but 
in vain. He went to a neighbour's to ask what had hap- 
pened; instead of replying, the neighbour turned away, as 
though not wishing to recognize him. Croisilles repeated his 
questions; he learned that his father, his affairs having 
long been in an embarrassed condition, had just become 
bankrupt, and had fled to America, abandoning to his credi- 
tors all that he possessed. 

Not realizing as yet the extent of his misfortune, Croisilles 
fdt overwhelmed by the thought that he might never again 
see his father. It seemed to him incredible that he should 
be thus suddenly abandoned; he tried to force an entrance 
into the store; but was given to understand that the offlcial 
seals had been affixed; so he sat down on a stone, and 
giving way to his grief, began to weep piteously, d^ to 
the consolations of those around him, never ceasing to call 
his father's name, though he knew him to be ahready far 



30 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

away. At last he rose, ashamed at seeing a crowd about 
him, and, in the mos£ profound despair, turned his stqps 
toward the harbour. 

On reaching the pier, he walked straight before him like 
a man in a trance, who knows neither who'e he is going, 
nor what is to become of him. He saw himself irretrievably 
lost, possessing no longer a shdter, no means of rescue and, 
of course, no longer any friends. Alone, wandaring on the 
seashore, he felt tempted to drown himself, then and there. 
Just at the moment when, yielding to this thou^t, he was 
advancing to the edge of a high cUff, an old servant named 
Jean, who had served his family for a number of years, 
arrived on the scene. 

"Ah! my poor Jeanl" he exclaimed, "you know all that 
has happened since I went away. Is it possible that my 
father could leave us without warning, without farewdl?" 

"He is gone," answered Jean, "but indeed not without 
sa)ring good-bye to you." 

At the same time he drew from his pocket a letter, which 
he gave to his yoimg master. Croisilles recognized the hand- 
writing of his father, and, before opening &e letter, kissed 
it rapturously; but it contained only a few words. Instead 
of feeling his trouble softened, it seemed to the young man 
still harder to bear. Honorable until then, and known as 
such, the old gentleman, ruined by an unforeseen disaster 
(the bankruptcy of a partner), had left for his son nothing 
but a few commonplace words of consolation, and no hope, 
except, perhs^s, that vague hope, without aim or reason, 
whidi constitutes, it is said, the last possession one loses. 

"Jean, my friend, you carried me in your arms^'' said 
Croisilles, when he had read the letter, "and jrou certainly 
are to-day the only being who loves me at all; it b a very 
sweet thing to me, but a very sad one for you; for, as sure 
as my father embarked there, I will throw myself into the 
same sea which is bearing him away; not before you, nor 
at once, but some day I will do it, for I am lost'' 

"What can you do?" replied Jean, not seemmg to have 
understood, but holding fast to the skirt of Crcnsilles' coat; 
"What can you do, my dear master? Your father was de- 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 31 

cdved; he was expecting money which did not come, and 
it was no small amoimt either. Could he stay here? I have 
seen him, sir, as he made his fortune, diuing the thirty years 
that I have served him; I have seen him working, attending 
to his business, the crown-pieces coming in one by one. He 
was an honorable man, and skilful; they took a cruel ad- 
vantage of him. Within the last few days, I was still there, 
and as fast as the crowns came in, I saw them go out of the 
shop again. Your father paid all he could, for a whole day, 
and, when his desk was empty, he could not help telling me, 
pointing to a drawer where but six francs remained: *There 
were a hundred thousand francs there this morning!' That 
does not look like a rascally failiu'e, sir? There is nothing in 
it that can dishonoiu* you." 

"I have no more doubt of my father's integrity," an- 
swered Croisilles, ^^than I have of his misfortune. Neither 
do I doubt his affection. But I wish I could have kissed 
him, for what is to become of me? I am not accustomed to 
poverty, I have not the necessary cleverness to build up my 
fortune. And, if I had it, my father is gone. It took him 
thirty years, how long would it take me to repair this dis- 
aster? Mudi longer. And will he be living then? Cer- 
tainly not; he will die over there, and I cannot even go 
and find him; I can join him only by dying." 

Utterly distressed as Croisilles was, he possessed much 
religious feeling. Although his despondency made him wish 
for death, he hesitated to take his life. At the first words 
of this interview, he had taken hold of old Jean's arm, and 
thus both returned to the town. When they had entered 
the streets and the sea was no longer so near: 

''It seems to me, sir," said Jean, "that a good man has a 
right to live and that a misfortime proves nothing. Since 
your father has not killed himself, thank God, how can you 
think of dying? Since there is no dishonour in his case, and 
all the town knows it is so, what would they think of you? 
That you felt imable to endiu"e poverty. It would be neither 
brave nor Christian; for, at the very worst, what is there 
to fri^ten you? There are plenty of people bom poor, and 
who have never had either mother or father to hdp them 



32 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

on. I know that we are not all alike, but, after all, nothing 
is impossible to God. What would you do in such a case? 
Yoiu" father was not bom rich, far from it, — ^meaning no 
offence — ^and that is perhaps what consoles him now. If 
you had been here, this last month, it would have given 
you courage. Yes, sir, a man may be rumed, nobody is 
secure from bankruptcy; but your father, I make bold to say, 
has borne himself, through it all, like a man, though he did 
leave us so hastily. But what could he do? It is not every 
day that a vessel starts for America. I accompanied him to 
the wharf, and if you had seen how sad he was! How he 
charged me to take care of you; to send him news from 
you! — Sir, it is a right poor idea you have, that throwing 
the helve after the hatchet. Every one has his time of trial 
in the world, and I was a soldier before I was a servant. I 
suffered severely at the time, but I was young; I was of 
your age, sir, and it seemed to me that Providence could 
not have spoken His last word to a young man of twenty- 
five. Why do you wish to prevent the khid God from re- 
pairing the evil that has befaJlen you? Give Him time, and 
all will come right. If I might advise you, I would say, 
just wait two or three years, and I will answer for it, 3rou 
will come out all right. It is always easy to go out of tUs 
world. Why will you seize an unlucky moment?" 

While Jean was thus exerting himself to persuade his mas- 
ter, the latter walked in silence, and, as those who suffer often 
jjo, was looking this way and that as though seeking for 
something whic^ might bind him to life. As chance would 
have it, at this jtmcture. Mademoiselle Godeau, the dau^- 
ter of the fermier-ginirid, happened to pass with her gov- 
erness. The mansion in which she lived was not far distant; 
Croisilles saw her enter it. This meeting produced on him 
more effect than all the reasonings in the world. I have 
said that he was rather erratic, and nearly always yielded to 
the first impulse. Without hesitating an instant, and with- 
out explanation, he suddenly left the arm of his old servant, 
and crossing the street, knocked at Monsieur Godeau's door. 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 33 

n 

When we try to picture to ourselves, nowadays, what was 
called a "financier" in times gone by, we invariably imagine 
enormous corpulence, short legs, a gigantic wig, and a broad 
face with a triple chin, — and it is not without reason that 
we have become accustomed to form such a picture of sudi 
a personage. Everyone knows to what great abuses the 
royal tax-farming led, and it seems as though there were 
a law of natiu-e which renders fatter than the rest of man- 
kind those who fatten, not only upon their own laziness, but 
also upon the work of others. 

Monsieur Godeau, among financiers, was one of the most 
classical to be found, — that is to say, one of the fattest. At 
the present time he had the gout, which was nearly as fash- 
ionable in his day as the nervous headache is in ours. 
Stretched upon a loimge, his eyes half-closed, he was cod- 
dling himself in the coziest comer of a dainty boudoir. The 
pand-mirrors which surrounded him, majestically duplicated 
<m every side his enormous person; bags filled with gold 
covered the table; around him, the furniture, the wainscot, 
the doors, the locks, the mantd-piece, the cdling were gilded; 
so was his coat. I do not know but that his brain was gilded 
too. He was calculating the issue of a little business affair 
which could not fail to bring him a few thousand louis; and 
was even deigning to smile over it to himself when Croisillea 
was announced. The yoimg man entered with an humble, 
but resolute air, and with every outward manifestation of 
that inward timiult with which we find no difficulty in cred- 
iting a man who is longing to drown himself. Monsieur 
Godeau was a little surprised at this imexpected visit; then 
he thought his daughter had been buying some trifle, and 
was confirmed in that thought by seeing her appear almost 
at the same time with the young man. He made a sign to 
Croisilles not to sit down but to speak. The young lady 
seated hersdf on a sofa, and Croisilles, remaining standing, 
expressed himself in these terms: 

"Sir, my father has failed. Jhe bankruptcy of a partner 
has forced him to suspend his payments, and imable to wit- 



34 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

ness his ovm shame, he has fled to America, after having 
paid his last sou to his creditors. I was absent when aD 
this happened; I have just come back and have known of 
these events only two hours. I am absolutely without re- 
sources, and determined to die. It is very probable that, on 
leaving your house, I shall throw myself into the water. In 
all probability, I would already have done so, if I had not 
chanced to meet, at the very moment, this young lady, your 
daughter. I love her, sir, from the very depths of my heart; 
for two years I have been in love with her, and my silence, 
imtil now, proves better than anything else the respect I 
fed for her; but to-day, in declaring my passion to you, I 
fulfill an imperative duty, and I would think I was offend- 
ing God, if, before giving myself over to death, I did not 
come to ask you Mademoisdle Julie in marriage. I have 
not the slightest hope that you will grant this request; but 
I have to make it, nevertheless, for I am a good Christian, 
sir, and when a good Qiristian sees himself come to sudi a 
point of misery that he can no longer suffer life, he must 
at last, to extenuate his crime, exhaust all the chances whidi 
remain to him before taking the final and fatal step." 

At the beginning of this speech. Monsieur Godeau had 
supposed that the young man came to borrow money, and 
so he prudently threw his handkerchief over the bags that 
were lying around him, preparing in advance a refusal, and 
a polite one, for he always fdt some good-will toward the 
father of Croisilles. But when he had heard the young man 
to the end, and understood the purport of his visit, he never 
doubted one moment but that the poor fellow had gone com- 
pletely mad. He was at first tempted to ring the bdl and 
have him put out; but, noticing his firm demeanor, his de- 
termined look, the fermier-giniral took pity on so inoffensive 
a case of insanity. He merely told his daughter to retire, so 
that she might be no longer exposed to hearing such im- 
proprieties. 

While Croisilles was speaking. Mademoiselle Godeau hal 
blushed as a peach in the month of August. At her father's 
bidding, s^e retired, the young man making her a profound 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 35 



bow, nvhich she did not seem to notice. Left alone 
Croisilles, Monsieur Godeau coughed, rose, and trying to 
assume a paternal air, delivered himself to the following 
effect. 

"My boy," said he, "I am i;nlling to believe that you are 
not poking fun at me, but you have really lost your head. 
I not only excuse this proceeding, but I consent not to 
punish you for it. I am sorry that your poor devil of a 
father has become bankrupt and has ^pped. It is indeed 
very sad, and I quite understand that such a misfortune 
should affect your brain. Besides, I wish to do something 
for you; so take this stool and sit down there." 

"It is useless, sir," answered Croisilles; "if you refuse me, 
as I see you do, I have nothing left but to take my leave. I 
Irish you every good fortxme." 

"And where are you going?" 

"To write to my father and say good-bye to him." 

"Eh I the devil! Any one would swear you were speaking 
fhe truth. Ill be damned if I don't think you are going to 
drown yourself." 

"Yes, sir; at least I think so, if my courage does not for* 
sake me." 

"That's a bright ideal Fie on you I How can you be 
such a fool? Sit down, sir, I tell you, and listen to me." 

Monsieur Godeau had just made a very wise reflection, 
which was that it is never agreeable to have it said that a 
man, whoever he may be, threw himself into the water on 
leaving your house. He therefore coughed once more, took 
his snuff-box, cast a careless glance upon his shirt-frill, and 
continued: 

"It is evident that you are nothing but a simpleton, a 
fool, a regular baby. You do not know what you are say- 
ing. You are ruined, that's what has happened to you. But, 
my dear friend, all that is not enough; one must reflect iqxm 
the things of this world. If you came to ask me — ^weD, 
t^ood advice, for instance, — ^I might give it to you; but 
':vhat is it you are after? You are in love with my dau^g^- 
ter?" 

"YeSy sir, and I repeat to you, that I am far from 8q>> 



36 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

posing that you can give her to me in marriage; but as 
there is nothing in the world but that, which coiidd prevent 
me from dying, if you believe in God, as I do not doubt 
you do, you will understand the reason that brings me here." 

"Whether I believe in God or not, is no business of yours. 
I do not intend to be questioned. Answer me first: where 
have you seen my daughter?" 

"In my father's shop, and in this house, when I brou^t 
jewelry for Mademoiselle Julie." 

"Who told you her name was Julie? What are we coming 
to, great heavens! But be her name Julie or Javotte, do you 
know what is wanted in any one who aspires to the band 
of the daughter of a fermier-giniral?" 

"Nb, I am completely ignorant of it, unless it is to be as 
rich as she." 

"Something more is necessary, my boy; you must have a 



name." 



"Weill my name is Croisilles." 

"Your name is Croisilles, poor wretch! Do you call tfaait 
a name?" 

"Upon my soul and conscience, sir, it seems to me to be . 
as good a name as Godeau." 

"You are very impertinent, sir, and you shall rue it" 

"Indeed, sir, do not be angry; I had not the least idea 
of offending you, and widi to punish me for it, there is no 
need to get angry. Have I not told you that on leaving here 
I am going straight to drown myself?" 

Although M. Godeau iiad promised himself to send Croi- 
dlles away as gently as possible, in order to avoid all scandal, 
his prudence could not resist the vexation of his wounded 
pride. The interview to which he had to resign himself was 
monstrous enough in itself; it may be imagined then, what 
he felt at hearing himself spoken to in such terms. 

"Listen," he said, almost beside himself, and determined 
to close the matter at any cost. "You are not such a fod 
that you cannot understand a word of common sense. Are 
you rich? No. Are you noble? Still less so. Vfholt is 
this frenzy that brings you here? You come to worry me, 
you think you are doing something clever; you know per- 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 37 

fectly well that it is iiseless; you wish to make me reqwnsible 
fOT your death. Have you any right to complain of me? 
Do I owe a sou to your father? Is it my fault that you 
have come to this? Mon Dieu! When a man is going to 
drown himself, he keeps about it " 

"That is what I am going to do now. I am your very 
humble servant." 

"One moment! It shall not be said that you had re- 
course to me in. vain. There, my boy, here are three louis 
d'or; go and have dinner in the kitchen, and let me hear no 
more about you." 

"Much obliged; I am not himgry, and I have no use for 
your money." 

So Croisillcs left the room, and the financier, having set 
his conscience at rest by the offer he had just made, settled 
himself more comfortably in his chair, and resumed his 
meditations. 

Mademoiselle Godeau, during this time, was not so far 
away as one might suppose; she had, it is true, withdrawn 
in obedience to her father; but, instead of going to her room, 
she had remained listening behind the door. If the extrava- 
gance of Croisilles seemed incredible to her, still she found 
nothing to offend her in it; for love, since the world has 
existed, has never passed as an insult. On the other hand, 
as it was not possible to doubt the despair of the young man, 
Mademoiselle Godeau found herself a victim, at one and the 
same time, to the two sentiments most dangerous to women — 
compassion and curiosity. When she saw the interview at 
an end, and Croisilles ready to come out, she rapidly crossed 
the drawing-room where die stood, not wishing to be sur- 
prised eavesdropping, and hurried towards her apartment; 
but she almost immediately retraced her steps. The idea 
that perhaps Croisilles was really going to put an end to 
his life troubled her in spite of herself. Scarcely aware of 
what she was doing, she walked to meet him; the drawing- 
room was large, and the two young people came slowly to- 
wards each other. Croisilles was as pale as death, and 
Mademoiselle Godeau vainly sought words to express her 
feelings. In pas^g beside him, she let fall on the floor 



38 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

a bunch of violets which she hdd in her hand. He at once 
bent down and picked up the bouquet in order to give it 
back to her, but instead of taking it, she passed on witbout 
uttering a word, and entered her father's room. CroisiDeSy 
alone again, put the flowers in his breast, and left the house 
with a troubled heart, not knowing what to think of Ui 
adventure. 

m 

Scarcely had he taken a few steps in the street, when 
he saw his faithful friend Jean running towards him with a 
joyful face. 

"What has happened?" he asked; "have you news to tdl 
me?" 

"Yes," replied Jean; "I have to tell you that the seab 
have been officially broken and that you can enter your 
home. All your father's debts being paid, you remain the 
owner of the house. It is true that sdl the money and all 
the jewels have been taken away; but at least ihe house 
belongs to you, and you have not 4ost everything. I have 
been running about for an hour, not knowing what had 
become of you, and I hope, my dear master, that you will 
now be wise enough to take a reasonable course." 

"What course do you wish me to take?" 

"Sell this house, sir, it is all our fortune. It will bring 
you about thirty thousand francs. With that at any rate 
you will not die of hunger; and what is to prevent you 
from buying a little stock in trade, and starting business for 
yourself? You would surely prosper." 

"We shall see about this," answered Croisilles, as he hm- 
ried to the street where his home was. He was eager to 
see the paternal roof again. But when he arrived there so 
sad a spectacle met his gaze, that he had scarcely the courage 
to enter. The shop was in oxtter disorder, the rooms de- 
serted, his father's alcove empty. Everything presented to 
his eyes the wretchedness of utter ruin. Not a chair re- 
named; all the drawers had been ransacked, the till broken 
open, the chest taken away; nothing had escaped the greedy 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 39 

seardi of creditors and lawyers; who, after having pillaged 
the house, had gone, leaving the doors open, as Uioug^ to 
testify to all passers-by how neatly their work was done. 

"TTiis, then/' exclaimed Croisilles, "is all that remains after 
thirty years of work and a respectable life, — ^and all throu^ 
the failure to have ready, on a given day, money enough to 
honour a signature imprudently given!" 

While the yoimg man walked up and down given over 
<o the saddest thoughts, Jean seemed very much embarrassed. 
He supposed that his master was without ready money, and 
that he might perhaps not even have dined. He was there- 
fore tr3n[ng to think of some way to question him on the 
subject, and to offer him, in case of need, some part of his 
savings. After having tortured his mind for a quarter of 
en hour to try and hit upon some way of leading u]> to the 
subject, he could find notiiing better than to come up to 
Croisilles, and ask him, in a kindly voice: 

"Sir, do you still like roast partridges?" 

The poor man uttered this question in a tone at once so 
comical and so touching, that Croisilles, in spite of his sad- 
ness, could not refrain from laughing. 

"And why do you ask me that?" said he. 

"My wife," replied Jean, "is cooking me some for dinner, 
sir, and if by chance you still liked them " 

Croisilles had completely forgotten till now the money 
which he was bringing back to his father. Jean's proposal 
reminded him that his pockets were full of gold. 

"I thank you with all my heart," said he to the old man, 
*%nd I accept your dinner with pleasure; but, if you are 
anxious about my fortune, be reassured. I have more money 
ftan I need to have a good supper this evening, which you, 
in your turn, will share with me." 

Saymg this, he laid upon the mantel four well-filled purses, 
which he emptied, each containing fifty louis. 

"Although this sum does not belong to me," he added, "I 
can use it for a day or two. To whom must I go to have 
it forwarded to my father?" 

"Sir," replied Jean, eagerly, "your father especially 
charged me to tell you that this money bdongs to you, and. 



40 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

if I did not speak of it before, it was because I did not know 
how your affairs in Paris had turned out Where he has 
gone your father will want for nothing; he will lodge with 
one of your correspondents, who will receive him most gladly; 
fae has moreover taken with him enough for his immediate 
needs, for he was quite sure of still leaving behind more 
than was necessary to pay all his just debts. All that he 
has left, sir, is yours; he says so himself in his letter, and I 
am especially charged to repeat it to you. That gold is, 
therefore, legitimately your property, as this house in v^ich 
we are now. I can repeat to you the very words your father 
said to me on embarking: *May my son forgive me for 
leaving him; may he remember that I am still in the world 
only to love me, and let him use what remains after my 
debts are paid as though it were his inheritance.' Those, 
sir, are his own expressions; so put this back in your pocket, 
and, since you accept my dinner, pray let us go home." 

The honest joy which shone in Jean's eyes, left no doubt in 
the mind of Croisilles. The words of his father had moved 
him to such a point that he could not restrain his tears; 
on the other hand, at such a moment, four thousand francs 
were no bagatelle. As to the house, it was not an available 
resource, for one could realize on it only by selling it, and 
that was both difficult and slow. All tiiis, however, could 
not but make a considerable change in the situation the 
yoimg man found himself in; so he felt suddenly moved— 
shaken in his dismal resolution, and, so to speak, both sad 
and, at the same time, relieved of much of his distress. 
After having closed the diutters of the shop, he left the house 
with Jean, and as he once more crossed tiie town, could not 
help thinking how small a thing our affections are, since 
they sometimes serve to make us find an unforeseen joy in 
the faintest ray of hope. It was with this thought that he 
sat down to dinner beside his old servant, who did not faO, 
during the repast, to make every effort to cheer him. 

Heedless people have a happy fault. They are easily cast 
down, but Aey have not even the trouble to console them- 
sdves, so changeable is their mind. It would be a mistake 
to think them, on that account, insensible or selfish; on the 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 41 

contrary ihey perhaps feel more keenly than others and 
are but too prone to blow their brains out in a moment of 
despair; but, this moment once passed, if they are still alive, 
they must (fine, they must eat, they must drink, as usual; 
only to melt into tears again, at bed-time. Joy and pain 
do not glide over them but pierce them through like ar- 
rows. Kind, hot-headed natures which know how to suffer, 
but not how to lie, through which one can clearly read, — 
not fragile and empty like glass, but solid and transparent 
like rock crystal. 

After having clinked glasses with Jean, Croisilles, instead 
of drowning himself, went to the play. Standing at the 
back og the pit, he drew from his bosom Mademoiselle 
Godeau's bouquet, and, as he breathed the perfume in deep 
meditation, he began to think in a calmer spirit about his 
adventure of the morning. As soon as he had pondered 
over it for awhile, he saw clearly the truth; that is to say, 
that the young lady, in leaving the bouquet in his hands, and 
in refusing to take it back, had wished to give him a mark 
of interest; for otherwise this refusal and tibis silence could 
it perhaps something of still less importance, — ^mere com- 
monplace pity? Had Mademoiselle Godeau feared to see 
Um die — ^him, Croisilles— or merely to be the cause of the 
death of a man, no matter what man? Although withered 
end almost leafless, the bouquet still retained so exquisite 
an odour and so brave a look, that in breathing it and look- 
ing at it, Croisilles could not help hoping. It was a thin 
guland of roses round a bunch of violets. What myste- 
rious depths of sentiment an Oriental might have read in 
these flowers, by interpreting their language! But after aO, 
he need not»be an Oriental in this case. The flowers which 
fall from the breast of a pretty woman, in Europe, as in the 
East, are never mute; were they but to tell what they have 
seen while reposing in that lovely bosom, it would be enough 
for a lover, and this^ in fact, they do. Perfumes have more 
than one resemblance to love, and there are even people who 
think love to be but a sort of perfume; it is true the flowers 
which exhale it are the most beautiful in creation. 



42 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

While Croisilles mused thus, pa3dng very little attention 
to the tragedy that was being actraat the time, Mademoisdle 
Godeau herself appeared in a box oppo^te. 

The idea did not occur to the young man that, if she 
should notice him, she might think it strange to( find the 
would-be suidde there after what had transpired in the 
morning. He, on the contrary, bent all his efforts towardd 
getting nearer to her; but he could not succeed. A fiftb-rate 
actress from Paris had come to play Mdrope, and the crowd 
was so dense that one could not move. For lack of anything 
better, Croisilles had to content himself with fixing his gaze 
upon his lady-love, not Mfting his eyes from her for a mo- 
ment. He noticed that she seemed preoccupied and moody, 
and that she spoke to every one with a sort of repugnance. 
Her box was surrounded, as may be imagined, by all the 
fops of the neighbourhood, each of whom passed several times 
before her in the gallery, totally unable to enter the box, 
of which her father filled more than three-fourths. Croisilles 
noticed further that she was not using her opera-glasses, nor 
was she listening to the piay. Her elbows resting on the 
balustrade, her chin in her band, with her far-away look, 
she seemed, in all her sumptuous apparel, like some statue of 
Venus disguised en marquise. The display of her dress and 
her hair, her rouge, beneath whidi one could guess her 
paleness, all the splendour of her toilet, did but the more 
distinctly bring out the immobility of her countenance. 
Never had Croisilles seen her so beautiful. Having foimd 
means, between the acts, to escape from the crush, he hur- 
ried off to look at her from the passage leading to her box, 
end, strange to say, scarcely had he reached it, when Made- 
moiselle Godeau, who had not stirred for the last hour, 
turned round. She started slightly as she noticed him and 
only cast a glance at him; then she resumed her former at- 
titude. ^.Vhether that glance expressed surprise, anxiety, 
pleasure or love; whether it meant "What, not dead!" or 
"God be praised! There you are, living! " — ^I do not pretend 
to explain. Be that as it may; at that glance, Crdsilles 
inwardly swore to himself to die or gain her love. 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 43 

IV 

Op all the obstacles which hinder the smooth course of 
love, the greatest is, without doubt, what is called false 
shame, which is indeed a very potent obstacle. 

Croisilles was not troubled with this unhappy failing, 
which both pride and timidity combine to produce; he was 
not one of those who, for whole months, hover roimd the 
woman they love, like a cat round a caged bird. As soon 
as he had given up the idea of drowning himself, he thought 
only of letting his dear Julie know that he lived solely for 
her. But how could he tell her so? Should he present him- 
self a second time at the mansion of the fermier-giniral, it 
was but too certain that M. Godeau would have him ejected. 
Julie, when she happened to take a walk, never went with- 
out her maid; it was therefore useless to undertake to follow 
her. To pass the nights imder the windows of one's beloved 
is a folly dear to lovers, but, in the present case, it would 
certainly prove vain. I said before that Croisilles was very 
religious; it therefore never entered his mind to seek to meet 
his lady-love at church. As the best way, though the most 
dangerous, is to write to people when one cannot speak to 
them in person, he decided on the very next day to write 
to the young lady. 

His letter possessed, naturally, neither order nor reason. 
It read somewhat as follows: 

''Mademoiselle : 

"Tell me exactly, I beg of you, what fortune one must 
possess to be able to pretend to your hand. I am asking you 
a strange question; but I love you so desperately, that it is 
impossible for me not to ask it, and you are the only person 
in the world to whom I can address it. It seemed to me, last 
evening, that you looked at me at the play. I had wished 
to die; would to God I were indeed dead, if I am mistaken, 
and if that look was not meant for me. Tell me if Fate 
can be so cruel as to let a man deceive himself in a manner 
at once so sad and so sweet. I believe that you commanded 
me to live. You are rich, beautiful. I know it. Your 



44 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

father is arrogant and miserly, and you have a ri^t to be 
proud; but I love you, and the rest is a dream. Fix your 
charming eyes on me; think of what love can do, when I 
who suffer so cruelly, who must stand in fear of everything, 
feel, nevertheless, an inexpressible joy in writing you tlids mad 
letter, which will perhaps bring down your anger upon me. 
But think also, mademoiselle, that you are a little to blame 
for this, my folly. Why did you drop that bouquet? Put 
yourself for an instant, if possible, in my place; I dare think 
that you love me, and I dare ask you to tell me so. For- 
give me, I beseech you. I would give my life's blood to be 
sure of not offending you, and to see you listening to my 
love with that angel smile which belongs only to you. 

"Whatever you may do, your image remains mine; you 
can remove it only by tearing out my heart. As long as 
your look lives in my remembrance, as long as the bouquet 
keeps a trace of its perfume, as long as a word will tell of 
love, I will cherish hope." 

Having sealed his letter, Croisilles went out and walked 
up and down the street opposite the Godeau mansion, waiting 
for a servant to come out. Chance, which always serves 
mysterious loves, when it can do so without compromising 
itself, willed it that Mademoiselle Julie's maid should have 
arranged to purchase a cap on that day. She was going to 
the milliner's when Croisilles accosted her, slipped a louis 
into her hand, and asked her to take charge of his letter. 
The bargain was soon struck; the servant took the money to 
pay for her cap and promised to do the errand out of grati- 
tude. Croisilles, full of joy, went home and sat at his door 
awaiting an answer. 

Before speaking of this answer, a word must be said about 
Mademoiselle Godeau. She was not quite free from iht 
vanity of her father, but her good nature was ever upper- 
most. She was, in the full meaning of the term, a spoilt 
child. She habitually spoke very little, and never was she 
seen with a needle in her hand; she spent her days at her 
toilet, and her evenings on the sofa, not seeming to hear the 
conversation going on around her. As regards her dress^ 



ALFRED DE MUSSlST 4S 

she was prodigiously coquettish, and her own face was 
surely what she thought most of on earth. A wrinkle in her 
collarette, an ink-spot on her finger, would have distressed 
her; and, when her dress pleased her, nothing can describe 
the last look which she cast at her mirror before leaving the 
room. She showed neitjher taste nor aversion for the pleas- 
ures in which young ladies usually delist. She went to balls 
willingly enough, and renounced going to them without a 
show of temper, sometimes without motive. The play 
wearied her, and she was in the constant habit of falling 
asleep there. When her father, who worshipped her, pro- 
posed to make her some present of her own choice, she took 
an hour to decide, not being able to think of anything she 
cared for. When M. Godeau gave a reception or a dinner, 
it often happened that Julie would not appear in the draw- 
ing-room, and at such times she passed the evening alone ui 
her own room, in full dress, walking up and down, her fan 
in her hand. If a compliment was addressed to her, she 
turned away her head, and if any one attempted to pay 
court to her, she responded only by a look at once so daz- 
zHng and so serious as to disconcert even the boldest. Never 
had a sally made her laugh; never had an air in an opera, 
a flight of tragedy, moved her; indeed, never had her heart 
given a sign of life; and, on seeing her pass in all the splen- 
dour of her nonchalant loveliness one might have taken her 
for a beautiful somnambulist, walking through the world as 
in a trance. 

So much indifference and coquetry did not seem easy to 
understand. Some said she loved nothing, others that she 
loved nothing but herself. A single word, however, siiffices 
to explaui her character, — she was waiting. From the age 
of fourteen she had heard it ceaselessly repeated that noth- 
ing was so charming as she. She was convinced of this, 
and that was why she paid so much attention to dress. In fail- 
ing to do honour to her own person, she would have thought 
fa^self guilty of sacrilege. She walked, in her beauty, so to 
speak, like a child in its holiday dress; but she was very 
far from thinkmg that her beauty was to remain useless. 
Beneath her apparent unconcern ^e had a will, secret, in- 



46 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

flexible, and the more potent the better it was concealed. The 
coquetry of ordinary women, which spends itself in ogling, 
in simpering, and in smiling, seemed to her a childish, vain, 
almost contemptible way of fighting with shadows. She 
felt herself in possession of a treasure, and she disdained to 
stake it piece by piece; she needed an adversary worthy of 
herself; but, too accustomed to see her wishes anticipated, 
she did not seek that adversary; it may even be said that 
she felt astonished at his failing to present himself. For the 
four or five years that she had been out in society and had 
conscientiously displayed her flowers, her furbelows, and 
her beautiful shoulders, it seemed to her inconceivable that 
she had not yet inspired some great passion. Had she said 
what was really bdiind her thoughts, she certainly would 
have replied to her many flatterers: "Well! if it is true that 
I am so beautiful, why do you not blow your brains out for 
me?'' An answer which many other yoimg girls mi^ make, 
and which more than one who says nothing hides away in 
a comer of her heart, not far perhap>s from the tip of her 
tongue. 

What is there, indeed, in the world, more tantali^g for 
a woman than to be young, rich, beautiful, to look at herself 
in her mirror and see herself charmingly dressed, worthy in 
every way to please, fully disposed to allow herself to be 
loved, and to have to say to herself: "I am admired, I am 
praised, all the world thinks me charming, but nobody loves 
me. My gown is by the best maker, my laces are superb, 
my coiffure is irreproachable, my face the most beautiful on 
earth, my figure slender, my foot prettily turned, and all 
this helps me to nothing but to go and yawn in the comer 
of some drawing-room! If a young man ^^eaks to me he 
treats me as a child; if I am asked in marriage, it is for 
my dowry; if somebody presses my hand in a dance, it b 
sure to be some provincial fop; as soon as I appear any- 
where, I excite a murmur of admiration; but nobody q)eaks 
low, in my ear, a word that makes my heart beat. I hear 
impertinent men praising me in loud tones, a couple of feet 
away, and never a look of humbly sincere adoration meets 
mine. Still I^have an ardent soul full of life, and I am not. 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 47 

fay any means, only a pretty doll to be shown about, to be 
nutde to dance at a ball, to be dressed by a maid in the 
morning and midressed at night — ^beginning the whole thing 
over again the next day." 

That is what Mademoiselle Godeau had many times said 
to herself; and there were hours when that thought in^ired 
her with so gloomy a feeling that she remained mute and 
almost motionless for a whole day. When Croisilles wrote 
her, she was in just sudi a fit of ill-humoiu'. She had just 
been taking her chocolate and was deep in meditation, 
stretched upon a lounge, when her maid entered and handed 
her tbe letter with a mysterious air. She looked at the ad- 
dress, and not recognizing the handwriting, fell agam to 
musing. The maid &en saw herself forced to explain what 
it was, which she did with a rather disconcerted air, not being 
at all sure how the young lady would take the matter. 
Mademoiselle Godeau listened without moving, then opened 
the letter, and cast only a glance at it; she at once asked for 
a Aeet of paper, and nonchalantly wrote these few words: 

''No, sir, I assure you I am not proud. If you had only 
a hundred thousand crowns, I would willingly marry you.'^ 

Such was the reply which the maid at once took to Cioi* 
siUes, who gave her another louis for her trouble. 



A HUNDRED thousand crowns are not found ''in a don- 
key's hoof-print," and if Croisilles had been suspicious he 
might have thought in reading Mademoiselle Godeau's let- 
ter that she was either crazy or laughing at him. He thought 
neither, for he only saw in it that his darling Julie loved him, 
and that he must have a hundred thousand crowns, and he 
dreamed from that moment of nothing but trying to secure 
them. 

He possessed two himdred louis in cash, plus a house 
which, as I have said, might be worth about thirty thousand 
francs. What was to be done? How was he to go about 
transfiguring these thirtyfour thousand francs, at a jimip, 
into ihree hundred thousand. The first idea which came 



48 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

into the mind of the young man was to find some way of 
staking his whole fortxme on the toss-up of a coin, but for 
that he must sell the house. Croisilles therefore began by 
putting a notice upon the door, stating that his house was 
for sale; then, while dreaming what he would do with the 
money ihsi he would get for it, he awaited a purchaser. 

A week went by, then another; not a single purchaser 
i^lied. More and more distressed, Croisilles spent ttiese ; 
days with Jean, and despair was taking possession of him 
once more, when a Jewish broker rang at the door. 

''This house is for sale, sir, is it not? Are you the owner 
of it?" 

"Yes, sir." 

'*And how much is it worth?" 

"Thirty thousand francs, I believe; at least I have heard 
my father say so." 

The Jew visited all the rooms, went upstairs and down 
into the cellar, knocking on the walls, counting the steps of 
the staircase, turning the doors on their hinges and the 
keys in their locks, opening and closing the windows; then, 
at last, after having thoroughly examined ever)rthmg, with- 
out saying a word and without making the slightest proposal, 
he bowed to Croisilles and retired. 

Croisilles, who for a whole hour had followed him with a 
palpitating heart, as may be imagined, was not a little dis- 
appointed at this silent retreat. He thought that perhaps 
the Jew had wished to give himself time to reflect and tteit 
he would return presently. He waited a week for him, not 
daring to go out for fear of missing his visit, and looking out 
of the windows from morning till night. But it was in vam; 
the Jew did not reappear. Jean, true to his unpleasant role 
of adviser, brought moral pressure to bear to dissuade his 
master from selling his house in so hasty a manner and for 
so extravagant a purpose. Dying of impatience, ennui, and 
love, Croisilles one morning took his two huridred louis and 
went out, determined to tempt fortune with this sum, ancc 
he could not have more. 

The gaminet-houses at that time were not public, and that 
refinement of civilization which enables the first comer to 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 49 

rain himself at all hours, as soon as the wish enters his 
mind, had not yet been invented. 

Scarcely was Croisilles in the street before he stopped, 
not knowing where to go to stake his money. He looked at 
the houses of the neighbourhood, and eyed them, one after 
the other, striving to discover su^icious appearances that 
might point out to him the object of his search. A good- 
looking young man, splendidly dressed, happened to pass. 
Judging from his mien, he was certainly a young man 0! 
gentle blood and ample leisure, so Croisilles politely accosted 
him. 

"Sir," he said, "I beg your pardon for the liberty I take. 
I have two himdred louis in my pocket and I am dying either 
to lose them or win more. Could you not point out to me 
some respectable place where such things are done?" 

At this rather strange speech the yoimg man burst out 
hughing. 

"Upon my word, sir!" answered he, "if you are seeking 
any such wicked place you have but to follow me, for that is 
just where I am going." 

Croisilles followed him, and a few steps farther they both 
entered a house of very attractive appearance, where they 
were received hospitably by an old gentleman of the high- 
est breeding. Several young men were already seated round 
a green cloth; Croisilles modestly took a place there, and 
in less than an hour his two hundred louis were gone. 

He came out as sad as a lover can be who thinks himself 
beloved. He had not enough to dine with, but that did 
not cause him any anxiety. 

"What can I do now," he asked himself, "to get money? 
To whom shall I address myself in this town? Who will 
lend me even a hundred louis on this house that I can not 
adl?" 

While he was in this quandary, he met his Jewish broker. 
He did not hesitate to address him, and, feaUierhead as he 
was did not fail to tell him the plight he was in. 

The Jew did not much want to buy the house; he had 
come to see it only through curiosity, or, to speak more 
exactly, for the satisfaction of his own consdencgi as a pass- 



so THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

ing dog goes into a kitchen, the door of which stands open, 
to see if there is nothing to steal. But when he saw Croi- 
sQles so despondent, so sad, so bereft of all resources, he 
could not resist the temptation to put himself to some in- 
convenience, even, in order to pay for the house. He there- 
fore offered him about one-fourth of its value. Croisilles 
fell upon his neck, called him his friend and saviour, blindly 
signed a bargain that would have made one's hair stand on 
end, and, on the very next day, the possessor of four hun- 
dred new louis, he once more turned his steps toward the 
gambling-'house where he had been so politely and speedily 
ruined the night before. 

On his way, he passed by the wharf. A vessel was about 
leaving; the wmd was gentle, the ocean tranquil. On all 
^des, merchants, sailors, of&cers in uniform were coming and 
going. Porters were canying enormous bales of merchan- 
dise. Passengers and their friends were exchanging fare- 
wells, small boats were rowing about in all directions; on 
every face could be read fear, impatience, or hope; and, 
amidst all th^ agitation which surrounded it, the majestic 
vessel swayed gently to and fro under the wind that swelled 
her proud sails. 

"What a grand thing it is," thou^t Croisilles, "to risk 
all one possesses and go beyond the sea, in perilous search 
of fortune I How it fills me with emotion to look at tills 
vessel setting out on her vo3^e, loaded with so mudi wealdi, 
with the welfare of so many families! What joy to see her 
come back again, bringing twice as much as was intrusted 
to her, returning so much prouder and richer than she went 
away! Why am I not one of those merchants? Why could 
I not stake my four hundred louis in this way? TTiis im- 
mense sea! What a green cloth, on which to boldly tempt 
fortime! Why should I not m5rself buy a few bales of 
doth or silk? What is to prevent my doing so, since I have 
gold? Why should this captain refuse to take charge of my 
merchandise? And who knows? Instead of going and 
throwins; away this — ^mv little all — in a Rambling-house, I 
might double it, I mipht triple it, perhai>s. by honest in 
dustry. If Julie truly loves me, she will wait a few yean. 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 51 

she wOl remain true to me until I am able to marry her. 
Commerce sometimes yields greater profits than one thinks; 
examples are not wanting in this world of wealth gained 
with astonishing rs^idity in this way on the changing waves 
— ^why should Providence not bless an endeavour made for 
a purpose so laudable, so worthy of His assistance? Among 
these merchants who have accumulated so much and who 
send their vessels to the ends of the world, more than one 
has begim with a smaller sum than I have now. They have 
prospered with the help of God; why should I not prosper 
m my turn? It seems to me as though a good wind were 
filling these sails, and this vessel inspires confidence. Come! 
the die is cast; I will speak to the captain, who seems to be 
a good fellow; I will then write to Julie, and set out to be- 
come a clever and successful trader." 

The greatest danger incurred by those who are habit- 
ually but half crazy, is that of becoming, at times, alto- 
gether so. The poor fellow, without further deliberation, 
put his whim into execution. To find goods to buy, when 
one has money and knows nothing about the goods, is the 
easiest thing in the world. The captain, to oblige Croisilles, 
took him to one of his friends, a manufacturer, who sold him 
as much cloth and silk as he could pay for. The whole of 
it, loaded upon a cart, was promptly taken on board. Croi- 
silles, delighted and full of hope, had himself written in 
large letters his name upon the bales. He watched them 
being put on board with inexpressible joy; the hour of de- 
parture soon came, and the vessel weighed anchor. 

VI 

I NEED not say that, in this transaction, Croisilles had 
kept no money in hand. His house was sold; and there 
remained to him, for his sole fortune, the clothes he had on 
his back; — no home, and not a sou. With the best will 
possible, Jean could not suppose that his master was re- 
duced to such an extremity; Croisilles was not too proud, 
but too thoughtless to tell Wm of it. So he determined to 
sleqp under the starry vault, and as for his meals, he made 



52 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

the following calculation: he presumed that the vessel which 
bore his fortune would be six months before coming back to 
Havre; Croisilles, therefore, not without regret, sold a gold 
watch his father had given him, and which he had fortu- 
nately kept; he got thirty-six livres for it. That was suf- 
ficient to live on for about six months, at the rate of four 
sous a day. He did not doubt that it would be enou^, 
and, reassured for the present, he wrote to Mademoiselle 
Godeau to inform her of what he had done. He was very 
careful in his letter not to speak of his distress; he an- 
nounced to her, on the contrary, that he had undertaken a 
magnificent commercial enterprise, of the speedy and for- 
tunate issue of which there could be no doubt; he explained 
to her that La Fleurette, a merchant-vessel of one himdred 
and fifty tons, was carrying to the Baltic his cloths and his 
silks, and implored her to remain faithful to him for a year, 
reserving to himself the right of asking, later on, for a further 
delay, while, for his part, he swore eternal love to her. 

When Mademoiselle Godeau received this letter, she was 
sitting before the fire, and had in her hand, using it as a 
screen, one of those bulletins which are printed in seaports, 
announcing the arrival and departure of vessels, and which 
also report disasters at sea. It had never occurred to her, 
as one can well imagine, to take an interest in this sort of 
thing; she had in fact never glanced at any of these sheets. 
The perusal of Croisilles* letter prompted her to read the 
bulletin she had been holding in her hand; the first word 
that caught her eye was no other than the name of La Fleur- 
ette. — ^The vessel had been wrecked on the coast of France, 
on the very ni.s:ht following its departure. The crew had 
barely escaped, but all the cargo was lost. 

Mademoiselle Godeau, at this news, no longer remembered 
that Croisilles had made to her an avowal of his poverty; 
she was as heartbroken as though a million had been at 
stake. In an instant, the horrors of the tempest, the fury 
of the winds, the cries of the drowning, the ruin of the man 
who loved her, presented themselves to her mind like a scene 
in a romance. The bulletin and the letter fell from her 
hands. She rose in great agitation and, with heaving breast 



ALFRED DE MUSSET S3 

and eyes brimming with tears, paced up and down, deter- 
mined to act, and asking herself how she should act. 

There is one thing that must be said in justice to love; 
it is that the stronger, the clearer, the simpler the consider- 
ations opposed to it, in a word, the less commonsense there 
is in the matter, the wilder does the passion become and the 
more does the lover love. It is one of the most beautiful 
things under heaven, this irrationality of the heart. We 
shoidd not be worth much without it. After having walked 
about the room (without forgetting either her dear fan or 
the passing glance at the mirror), Julie allowed herself to 
sink once more upon her lounge. Whoever had seen her at 
this moment would have looked upon a lovely sight; her 
eyes sparkled, her cheeks were on fire; she sighed deeply, 
and murmured in a delicious transport of joy and pain: 

"Poor fellow! He has ruined himself for me!" 

Independently of the fortune which she could expect from 
her father. Mademoiselle Godeau had in her own right the 
property her mother had left her. She had never thought 
of it. At thas moment, for the first time in her life, she 
remembered that she could dispose of five hundred thousand 
francs. This thought brought a smile to her lips; a project, 
strange, bold, wholly feminine, almost as mad as Croialles 
himself, entered her head; — she weighed the idea in her mind 
for some time, then decided to act upon it at once. 

She began by inquiring whether Croisilles had any rela- 
tives or friends; the maid was sent out in all directions to 
find out. Having made minute inquiries in all quarters, she 
discovered, on the fourth floor of an old rickety house, a 
half-crippled avmt, who never stirred from her arm-chair, 
and had not been out for four or five years. This poor 
woman, very old, seemed to have been left in the world ex- 
pressly as a specimen of human misery. Blind, gouty, al- 
most deaf, she lived alone in a garret; but a gayety, stronger 
than misfortune and illness, sustained her at eighty years 
of age, and made her still love life. Her neighbours never 
passed her door without going in to see her, and the anti- 
quated tunes she himimed enlivened all the girls of the 
nei^bourhood. She possessed a little annuity which suf- 



54 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

ficed to maintain her; as long as day lasted, she knitted. 
She did not know what had happened since the death of 
Louis XIV. 

It was to this worthy person that Julie had herself pri- 
vately conducted. She donned for the occasion all her 
finery; feathers, laces, ribbons, diamonds, nothing was 
spared. She wanted to be fascinating; but the real secret 
of her beauty, in this case, was the whim that was carrying 
her away. She went up the steep, dark staircase which led 
to the good lady's chamber, and, after the most graceful 
bow, spoke somewhat as follows: 

"You have, madame, a nephew, called Croisilles, who 
loves me and has asked for my hand; I love him, too, and 
wish to marry him; but my father. Monsieur Godeau, fer- 
mier-giniral of thds town, refuses his consent, because your 
nephew is not rich. I would not, for the world, give oc- 
casion to scandal, nor cause trouble to anybody; I would 
therefore never think of disposing of myself without the con- 
sent of my family. I come to ask you a favour, which I 
beseech you to grant me. You must come yourself and 
propose this marriage to my father. I have, thank God, a 
little fortime which is quite at your disposal; you may take 
possession, whenever you see fit, of five hundred thousand 
francs at my notary's. You will say that this sum belongs 
to your nephew, which in fact it does. It is not a present that 
I am making him, it is a debt which I am paying, for I 
am the cause of the ruin of Croisilles, and it is but just that 
I should repair it. My father will not easily give in; you 
will be obliged to insist and you must have a little courage; 
I, for my part, will not fail. As nobody on earth excepting 
myself has any right to the sum of which I am speaking to 
you, nobody will ever know in what way this amount will 
have passed into your hands. You are not very rich your- 
self, I know, and you may fear that people will be astonished 
to see you thus endowing your nephew; but remember that 
my father does not know you, that you show yourself very 
little in town, and that, consequently, it will be easy for 
you to pretend that you have just arrived from some journey. 
This step will doubtless be some exertion to you; you wQI 



ALFRED DE MUSSET 55 

have to leave your arm-chair and take a little trouble; but 
you will make two people happy, madame, and if you have 
ever known love, I hope you will not refuse me." 

Ilie old lady, during this discourse, had been in turn 
surprised, anxious, touched, and delighted. The last words 
persuaded her. 

"Yes, my child," she repeated several times, "I know what 
it is, — ^I know what it is." 

As she said this she made an efiFort to rise; her feeble 
limbs could barely support her; Julie quickly advanced and 
put out her hands to help her; by an almost involuntary 
movement they found themselves, in an instant, in each 
other's arms. A treaty was at once concluded; a warm kiss 
sealed it in advance, and the necessary and confidential con- 
sultation followed without further trouble. 

All the explanations having been made, the good lady drew 
from her wardrobe a venerable gown of taffeta, which had 
been her wedding-dress. This antique piece of property was 
not less than fifty years old; but not a spot, not a grain of 
dust had disfigured it; Julie was in ecstasies over it. A 
coach was sent for, the handsomest in the town. The good 
lady prepared the speech she was going to make to Monsieur 
Godeau; Julie tried to teach her how she was to touch the 
heart of her father, and did not hesitate to confess that love 
of rank t^as his vulnerable point. 

"If you could imagine," said she, "a means of flattering 
this weakness, you will have won our cause." 

The good lady pondered deeply, finished her toilet wiA- 
out another word, clasped the hands of her future niece, and 
entered the carriage. She soon arrived at the Godeau man- 
sion; there, she braced herself up so gallantly for her en- 
trance that she seemed ten years younger. She majestically 
crossed the drawing-room where Julie's bouquet had fallen, 
and, ^en the door of the boudoir opened, said in a firm 
voice to the lackey who preceded her: 

"Announce the dowager Baroness de Croisilles." 

These words settled the happiness of the two lovers. Mon- 
sieur Godeau was bewildered by them. Although five hun- 
dred thousand francs seemed little to him, he consented to 



S6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

everything, in order to make his daughter a banmesB, a 
sudi she became; — iidio would dare axitest her title? I 
my part, I think she had thorougjily earned it 



THE MUMMY'S FOOT 

{Le Pied de Momie) 
By THEOPHILE GAUTIER 

I HAD altered, in an idle mood, the shop of one of those 
curiosity venders who are called marchands de bric-a-brac 
in that Parisian argot which is so perfectly unintelligible 
elsewhere in France. 

You have doubtless glanced occasionally through the win- 
dows of some of these shops, which have become so numer- 
ous now that it is fashionable to buy antiquated furniture, 
and that every petty stockbroker thinks he must have his 
chambre au moyen age. 

There is one thing there which clings alike to the shop of 
the dealer in old iron, the ware-room of the tapestry msJter, 
the laboratory of the chemist, and the studio of the painter: 
in all those gloomy dens where a furtive daylight filters 
in through the window-gutters the most manifestly ancient 
thing is dust. The cobwebs are more authentic than the 
guimp laces, and the old pear-tree furniture on exhibition 
is actually yoimger than the mahogany which arrived but 
yesterday from America. 

The warehouse of my bric-i-brac dealer was a veritable 
Capjiamaum. All ages and all nations seemed to have made 
their rendezvous there. An Etruscan lamp of red clay stood 
upon a Boule cabinet, with ebony panels, brightly striped 
by lines of inlaid brass; a duchess of the court of Louis 
XV. nonchalantly extended her fawn-like feet under a mas- 
Translated by Lafcadio Heam. G>pyrigfat, 1890, by Nortfainf- 
loa G>. Copyright, i899» l>y Brentano. 

5Z 



S8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

sive table of the time of Louis Xm., with heavy ^iral sup- 
ports of oak, and carven designs of chimeras and foliage 
intermingled. 

Upon the denticulated shelves of several sideboards glit- 
tered immense Japanese dishes with red and blue designs 
relieved by gilded hatching, side by side with enamelled 
works by Bernard Palissy, representing serpents, frogs, and 
lizards in relief. 

From disembowelled cabinets escaped cascades of silver- 
lustrous Chinese silks and waves of tinsel, which &n oblique 
sunbeam shot through with luminous beads, while portraits 
of every era, in frames more or less tarnished, smiled 
through their yellow varnish. 

The striped breastplate of a damascened suit of Milanese 
armour glittered in one comer; loves and n3miphs of porce- 
lain, Chinese grotesques, vases of cMadon and crackle-ware, 
Saxon and old S6vres cups encumbered the shelves and 
nooks of the s^rtment. 

The dealer followed me closely through the tortuous way 
contrived between the piles of furniture, warding off with 
his hand the hazardous sweep of my coat-skirts, watching 
my elbows with the uneasy attention of an antiquarian and 
a usurer. 

It was a singular face, that of the merchant; an immense 
skull, polished like a knee, and surrounded by a thin aureole 
of white hair, which brought out the clear salmon tint of 
his complexion all the more strikingly, lent him a false 
aspect of patriarchial bonhotme, counteracted, however, by 
the scintillation of two little yellow eyes which trembled in 
their orbits like two louis-d'or upon quick silver. The curve 
of his nose presented an aquiline silhouette, which suggested 
the Oriental or Jewish type. EEs hands — thin, slender, full 
of nerves which projected like strings upon the finger-board 
of a violin, and armed with claws like those on the ter- 
minations of bats' wings — shook with senile trembling; but 
those convulsively agitated hands became firmer than sted 
pincers or lobsters' claws when they lifted any predous 
article — an onyx cup, a Venetian glass, or a dish of Bo- 
hemian crystal. Tliis strange old man had an aspect so 



THmPHILE GAUTIER 59 

^OTOUghly rabbinical and cabalistic that be would have 
been burnt on the mere testimony of his face three cen- 
turies ago. 

"Will you not buy something from me to-day, sir? Here 
is a Malay kreese with a blade undulating like flame. Look 
at those grooves contrived for the blood to run along, those 
teeth set backward so as to tear out the entrails in with- 
drawing the weapon. It is a fine character of ferocious arm, 
and will look well in your collection. This two-handed 
sword is very beautiful. It is the work of Josephe de la 
Hera; and this coltche-marde, with its fenestrated guard — 
what a superb specimen of handicraft!" 

"No; I have quite enough weapons and instruments of 
carnage. I want a small figure, something which will suit 
me as a paper-weight, for I cannot endure those trumpery 
bronzes which the stationers sell, and which may be found 
on everybody's desk." 

The old gnome foraged among his ancient wares, and 
finally arranged before me some antique bronzes, so-called at 
least; fragments of malachite, little Hindoo or Chinese idols, 
a kind of poussah-toys in jade-stone, representing the in- 
carnations of Brahma or Vishnoo, and wonderfully. approp- 
riate to the very imdivine office of holding papers and let- 
ters in place. 

I was hesitating between a porcelain dragon, all constd* 
lated with warts, its mouth formidable with bristling tusks 
and ranges of teeth, and an abominable little Mexican fetich, 
representing the god Vitziliputzili au naturel, when I caught 
sight of a charming foot, which I at first took for a frag- 
ment of some antique Venus. 

It had those beautiful ruddy and tawny tints that lend 
to Florentine bronze that warm, living look so much prefer- 
able to the gray-green zspect of common bronzes, which 
mi^t easily be mistaken for statues in a state of putrefac- 
tion. Satiny gleams played over its rounded forms, doubt- 
less polished by the amorous kisses of twenty centuries, for 
it seemed a Corinthian bronze, a work of ihe best era of 
arty perhaps moulded by Lysip^us himself. 

"That foot will be my choice," I said to the merchant, who 



6o THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

regarded me with an ircmical and satnmine air, and hdd out 
the object desired that I mi^t examine it more fidly. 

I was surprised at its li^tness. It was not a foot of 
metal, but in sooth a foot of fle^ an embalmed foot, a 
mtmuny's foot. On examining it still more dosdy the very 
grain of the skin, and the almost imperc^tible lines im- 
pressed upon it by the texture of the bandars, became per- 
ceptible. The toes were slender and delicate, and terminated 
by perfectly formed nails, pure and tran^)arent as agates. 
llie great toe, slightly sepstrated from the rest, afforded a 
happy contrast, in the antique style, to the position of the 
other toes, and lent it an aerial li^tness — ^the grace of a 
bird^s foot. The sole, scarcely streaked by a few almost 
imperceptible cross lines, afforded evidence that it had never 
touched the bare ground, and had only come in contact with 
the finest matting of Nile rushes and the softest carpets of 
pantiier skin. 

'^Ha, ha, you want the foot of the Princess Hermontfais!" 
exclaimed the merchant, with a strange giggle, fixing his 
owlish eyes upon me. "Ha, ha, ha! For a paper-wei^t! 
An original idea! — artistic idea! Old Pharaoh would cer- 
tainly have been surprised had some one told him that the 
foot of his adored daughter would be used for a paper-weight 
after he had had a mountain of granite hollowed out as a 
receptacle for the triple coffin, painted and gilded, covered 
with hierogl)T>hics and beautiful paintings of the Judgment 
of Souls," continued the queer little merchant, half audibly, 
as though talking to himself. . 

"How much will you charge me for this mummy frag- 
ment?" 

"Ah, the highest price I can get, for it is a superb piece. 
If I had the match of it you could not have it for less than 
five hundred francs. The daughter of a Pharaoh! Nothing 



IS more rare." 



"Assuredly that is not a common article, but still, how 
much do you want? In the first place let me warn you that 
all my wealth consists of just five louis. I can buy anything 
that costs five louis, but nothing dearer. You mig^t search 



TH&OPHILE GAUTIER 6i 

my vest pockets and most secret drawers without even find- 
ing one poor five-franc piece more." 

"Five louis for the foot of the Princess HermonthisI 
That is very little, very little indeed. 'Tis an authentic 
foot/' muttered the merchant, shaking his head, and im- 
parting a peculiar rotary motion to his eyes. "Well, take 
it, and I will give you the bandages into the bargain," he 
added, wrapping the foot in an ancient damask rag. "Veiy 
fine! Real damask — Indian damask which has never been 
redyed. It is strong, and yet it is soft," he mumbled, strok- 
ing the frayed tissue with his fingers, through the trade- 
acquired habit which moved him to praise even an object of 
sudi little value that he himself deemed it only worth the 
giving away. 

He poured the gold coins into a sort of mediaeval alma- 
purse hanging at his belt, repeating: 

"The foot of the Princess Hermonthis to be used for a 
paper-weight!" 

Then turning his phosphorescent eyes upon me, he ex- 
claimed in a voice strident as the crying of a cat which has 
swallowed a fish-bone: 

"Old Pharaoh will not be well pleased. He loved his 
daughter, the dear man!" 

"You speak as if you were a contemporary of his. You 
are old enough, goochiess knows! but you do not date back 
to the Pyramids of Egypt," I answered, laughingly, from the 
threshold. 

I went home, delighted with my acquisition. 

With the idea of putting it to profitable use as soon as 
possible, I placed the foot of the divine Princess Hermonthis 
upon a heap of papers scribbled over with verses, in them- 
selves an undecipherable mosaic work of erasures; articles 
freshly begun; letters forgotten, and posted in the table 
drawer instead of the letter-box, an error to which absent- 
minded people are peculiarly liable. The effect was charm- 
ing, bizarre, and romantic. 

Well satisfied with this embellishment, I went out with 
the gravity and pride becoming one who feels that he has 
the ineffable advantage over all the passers-by whom he 



62 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

elbows, of possessing a piece of the Princess Hermontfais, 

daughter of Pharaoh. 

I looked upon all who did not possess, like myself, a 
paper-weight so authentically £g3^tian as very ridiculous 
people, and it seemed to me that the proper occupation of 
every sensible man should consist in the mere fact of hav- 
ing a mummy's foot upon his desk. 

Happily I met some friends, whose presence distracted me 
in my infatuation with this new acquisition. I went to din- 
ner with them, for I could not very well have dined with 
myself. 

When I came back that evening, with my brain slightly 
confused by a few glasses of wine, a vague whiff of Orientid 
perfume delicately titillated my olfactory nerves. The heat 
of the room had warmed the natron, bitumen, and m3nTh in 
which the parasckistes, who cut open the bodies of the dead, 
had bathed the corpse of the princess. It was a perfume 
at once sweet and penetrating, a perfume that four thousand 
years had not been able to dissipate. 

The Dream of Egypt was Eternity. Her odours have the 
solidity of granite and endure as long. 

I soon drank deeply from the black cup of sleep. For a 
few hours all remained opaque to me. Oblivion and noth- 
ingness inundated me with their sombre waves. 

Yet light gradually dawned upoji the darkness of my 
mind. Dreams commenced to touch me softly in their si- 
lent flight. 

The eyes of my soul were opened, and I beheld my cham- 
ber as it actually was. I might have believed mysdf awake 
but for a vague consciousness which assured me Aat I slept, 
and that something fantastic was about to take place. 

The odour of the myrrh had augmented in intensity, and I 
felt a slight headache, which I very naturally attributed 
to several glasses of champagne that we had drunk to the 
unknown gods and our future fortimes. 

I peered throu2:h mv room with a feeling of expectation 
which I saw nothing to iustify. Every article of furniture 
was in its proper place. The lamp, softly shaded by its globe 
of groimd crystal, burned upon its bracket; the water-odour 



THJSOPHILE GA UTIER 63 

sketches shone imder their Bohemian ^ass; the curtains 
hung down languidly; everything wore an aspect of tran- 
quil slumber. 

After a few moments, however, all this calm interior ap- 
peared to become disturbed- Tlie woodwork cracked stealA- 
fly, the ash-covered log suddenly emitted a jet of blue flame, 
and the disks of the pateras seemed like great metallic eyes, 
watching, like myself, for the things which were about to 
happen. 

My eyes accidentally fell upon the desk where I had 
placed the foot of the Jhincess Hermonthis. 

Instead of remaining quiet, as behooved a foot which 
had been embalmed for four thousand years, it commenced 
to act in a nervous manner, contracted itself, and leaped 
over the papers like a startled frog. One would have imag- 
ined that it had suddenly been brought into contact with a 
galvanic battery. I could distinctly hear the dry sound 
made by its litUe heel, hard as the hoof of a gazelle. 

I became rather discontented with my acquisition, inas- 
much as I wished my paper-weights to be of a sedentary 
di^X)sition, and thoug!ht it very tmnatural that feet should 
y walk about without legs, and I commenced to experience 
a feeling closely akin to fear. 

Suddenly I saw the folds of my bed-curtain stir, and 
heard a bumping soimd, like that caused by some person 
hopping on one foot across the floor. I must confess I 
became alternately hot and cold, that I felt a strange wind 
chill my back, and that my suddenly rising hair caused my 
nigjit-cap to execute a leap of several yards. 

The bed-curtains opened and I beheld the strangest fig- 
ure imaginable before me. 

It was a young girl of a very deep coffee-brown com- 
plexion, like the bayadere Amani, and possessing the purest 
Egyptian type of perfect beauty. Her eyes were almond- 
shaped and oblique, with eyebrows so black that they 
seemed blue; her nose was exquisitely chiselled, almost 
Greek in its delicacy of outline; and she might indeed have 
been taken for a Corinthian statue of bronze but for the 
prcnninence of her cheek-bones and the slightly African ful- 



64 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

ness of her lips, which compelled one to recognize her as 
belonging beyond all doubt to the hieroglyphic race which 
dwelt upon the banks of the Nile. 

Her arms, slender and spindle-shaped like those of very 
young g^rls, were encircled by a peculiar kind of metal baiub 
and bracelets of glass beads; her hair was all twisted into 
little cords, and she wore upon her bosom a little idol-figure 
of green paste, bearing a whip with seven lashes, which 
proved it to be an image of Isis; her brow was adorned with 
a shining plate of gold, and a few traces of paint relieved 
the coppery tint of her cheeks. 

As for her costume, it was very odd indeed. 

Fancy a pagne, or skirt, all formed of little strips of ma- 
terial bedizened with red and black hieroglyphics, stiffened 
with bitumen, and apparently, belonging to a freshly un- 
bandaged mummy. 

In one of those sudden flights of thought so common in 
dreams I heard the hoarse falsetto of the bric-^-brac dealer, 
repeating like a monotonous refrain the phrase he had ut- 
tered in his shop with so enigmatical an intonation: 

"Old Pharaoh will not be well pleased. He loved bis 
daughter, the dear man!" 

One strange circumstance, which was not at all calcu- 
lated to restore my equanimity, was that the ap^rition had 
but one foot; the other was broken off at the ankle I 

She approached the table where the foot was startmg and 
fidgetting about more than ever, and there supported herself 
upon the edge of the desk. I saw her eyes fill with pearly 
gleaming tears. 

Although she had not as yet spoken, I fully comprehended 
the thoughts which agitated her. She looked at her foot — 
for it was indeed her own — ^with an exquisitely graceful 
expression of coquettish sadness, but the foot leaped and 
ran hither and thither, as though impelled on steel brings. 

Twice or thrice she extended her hand to seize it, but 
could not succeed. 

nrhen commenced between the Princess Hermonthis and 
her foot — which appeared to be endowed with a special life 
of its own — a very fantastic dialogue in a most ancient Q)p- 



TEtOPHlLE GAUTIER 65 

tic tongue, such as might have been spoken thirty centuries 
ago in the syrinxes of 2ie land of Ser. Luckily I understood 
Coptic perfectly well that night. 

The Princess Hennonthis cried, in a voice sweet and 
vibrant as the tones of a crystal bell: 

"Well, m> i^ear little foot, you always flee from me, yet 
I always took good care of you. I bathed you with per- 
fumed water in a bowl of alabaster; I smoothed your hed 
with pumice-stone mixed with palm oil; your nails were cut 
with golden scissors and polished with a hippopotamus tooth; 
I was careful to select tatbebs for you, painted and em- 
broidered and turned up at the toes, whidi were the envy 
of all the young girls in Egypt. You wore on your great toe 
rings bearing the device of the sacred Scarabaus, and you 
supported one of the lightest bodies that a lazy foot could 
sustain." 

The foot replied in a pouting and chagrined tone: 

"You know well that I do not belong to myself any 
longer. I have been bought and paid for. The old mer- 
chant knew what he was about. He bore you a grudge 
for having refused to espouse him. This is an ill turn whidi 
he has done you. The Arab who violated your royal coffin 
in the subterranean pits of the necropolis of Thebes was 
sent thither by him. He desired to prevent you from being 
present at the reunion of the shadowy nations m the cities 
below. Have you five pieces of gold for my ransom?" 

"Alas, no I My jewels, my rings, my purses of gold and 
silver were all stolen from me," answered the Princess Hcr- 
monthis, with a sob. 

"Princess," I then exclaimed, "I never retained anybody's 
foot unjustly. Even though you have not got the five louis 
which it cost me, I present it to you gladly. I should fed 
unutterably wretched to think that I were the cause of so 
amiable a person as the Princess Hermonthis being lame.** 

I delivered this discourse in a royally gallant, troubadour 
tone which must have astonished the beautiful Egyptian 
girl. 

She turned a look of deepest gratitude upon me, and her 
eyes shone with bluish gleams of light 



66 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

She took her foot, which surrendered itself willing this 
time, like a woman about to put on her little shoe, and ad- 
justed it to her leg with much skill. 

This operation over, she took a few steps about the room^ 
as thou^ to assiire herself that she was really no longier 
lame. 

"Ah, how pleased my father will be I He who was so 
unhappy because of my mutilation, and who from the mo- 
ment of my birth set a whole nation at work to hollow me 
out a tomb so deep that he might preserve me intact until 
that last day, when souls must be weighed in the balance 
of Amenthi! Come with me to my father. He will receive 
you kindly, for you have given me back my foot." 

I thought this proposition natural enough. I arrayed 
myself in a dressing-gown of large-flowered pattern, which 
lent me a very Pharaonic aspect, hurriedly put on a pdr 
of Tiu-kish slippers, and informed the Princess Hermonthis 
that I was ready to follow her. 

Before starting, Hermonthis took from her neck the little 
idol of green paste, and laid it on the scattered dieets of 
paper which covered the table. 

"It is only fair," she observed, smilingly, "that I should 
replace your paper-weight." 

She gave me her hand, which felt soft and cold, like the 
skin of a serpent, and we departed. 

We passed for some time with the velocity of an arrow 
through a fluid and grayish exp>anse, in which half-fcmned 
silhouettes flitted swiftly by us, to right and left 

For an instant we saw only sky and sea. 

A few moments later obelisks commenced to tower in the 
distance; pylons and vast flights of steps guarded by q>hinzes 
became clearly outlined against the horizon. 

We had reached our destination. 

The princess conducted me to a mountain of rose-ooloured 
granite, in the face of which appeared an opening so narrow 
and low that it would have been difficult to (Ustinguish it from 
the fissures in the rock, had not its location been marked 
by two stelae wrought with sculptures. 

Hermonthis kindled a torch and led the way before mfr 



TH&OPHILE GAUTIER 67 

We traversed corridors hewn through the living rock. 
Their walls, covered with hieroglyphics and paintings of al- 
legorical processions, might well have occupied thousands of 
arms for thousands of years in their formation. These corri- 
dors of interminable length opened into square chambers, 
in the midst of which pits had been contrived, through which 
we descended by cramp-irons or spiral stairways. These 
pits again conducted us into other chambers, opening into 
other corridors, likewise decorated with painted sparrow- 
hawks, serpents coiled in circles, the S3mfibols of the tau and 
pedun — prodigious works of art which no living eye can 
ever examine — ^interminable legends of granite whidi only 
the dead have time to read through all eternity. 

At last we found ourselves in a hall so vast, so enormous, 
so immeasurable, that the eye could not reach its limits. 
FOes ef monstrous colimms stretched far out of sight on 
every side, between which twinkled livid stars of yellowish 
flame; points of light which revealed further deptlis incal- 
culable in the darkness beyond. 

The Princess Hermonthis still held my hand, and gra- 
ciously saluted the mummies of her acquaintance. 

My eyes became accustomed to the dim twilight, and ob- 
jects became discernible. 

I beheld the kings of the subterranean races seated upon 
thrones — grand old men, though dry, withered, wrinkled like 
parchment, and blackened with naphtha and bitumen — all 
wearing pshents of gold, and breast-plates and gorgets glit- 
tering with precious stones, their eyes immovably fixed like 
the eyes of sphinxes, and their long beards whitened by the 
mow of centuries. Behind them stood their peoples, in the 
stiff and constrained pasture enjoined by E^j^ptian art, all 
eternally preserving the attitude prescribed by the hieratic 
code. Bdiind these nations, the cats, ibixes, and crocodiles 
contemporary with them — ^rendered monstrous of aspect by 
their swathing bands — ^mewed, flapped their wings, or ex- 
tended their jaws in a saurian giggle. 

All the Pharaohs were there— Cheops, Qiephrenes, Psam- 
metichus, Sesostris, Amenotaph — all the dark rulers of the 
pyramids and sphinxes. On yet higher thrones sat Chronos 



68 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

and Xixouthros, who was contenqx>Tary with the dduge, and 
Tubal Cain, who reigned before it 

The beard of Ring Xixouthros had grown seven times 
around the granite table, upon which he leaned, lost in deq> 
reverie, and buried in dreams. 

Farther back, through a dusty doud, I behdd dimly 
the seventy-two preadamite kings, with their seventy-two 
peoples, forever passed away. 

After permitting me to gaze upon this bewfldering spec- 
tade a few moments, the Princess Hermonthis presented me 
to her father Pharaoh, who favowed me with a most gradous 
nod. 

"I have found my foot agami I have found my foot!" 
cried the princess, dapping her little hands together with 
every sign of frantic joy. "It was this gentleman who re- 
stored it to me." 

The races of Kemi, the races of Nahasi— all the black, 
bronzed, and copper-coloured nations repeated in chorus: 

"The Princess Hermonthis has found her foot again!" 

Even Xixouthros himself was visibly affected. 

He raised his heavy eyelids, stroked his mustache with 
his fingers, and turned upon me a glance weighty with cen- 
turies, y 

"By 0ms, the dog of Hell, and Tmei, daughter of ^e Sun 
and of Truth, this is a brave and worthy lad!" exdaimed 
Pharaoh, pointing to me with his sceptre, which was ter- 
minated with a lotus-flower. 

"What recompense do you desire?" 

Filled with that daring inspired by dreams in wfaidi 
nothing seems impossible, I asked him for the hand of the 
Princess Hermonthis. The hand seemed to me a very proper 
antithetic recompense for the foot. 

Pharaoh opened wide his great eyes of glass in astonish- 
ment at my witty request. 

"What country do you come from, and what is your 
age?" 

"I am a Frenchman, and I am twenty-seven years dd, 
venerable Pharaoh." 

'Twenty-seven years old, and he wishes to e^x>use the 



TH£OPHlLE GAUTIER 6$ 

Princess Hennonthis who is thirty centuries old I" cried out 
at once all the Thrones and all the Circles of Nations. 

Only Hermonthis herself did not seem to think my re- 
quest unreasonable. 

"If you were even only two thousand years old," replied 
the ancient king, "I would willingly give you the princess, 
but the disproportion is too great; and, besides, we must 
give our daughters husbands who will last well. You do not 
know how to preserve yourselves any longer. Even those 
who died only fifteen centuries ago are already no more 
than a handfid of dust. Behold, my flesh is solid as basalt, 
my bones are bars of steel I 

"I will be present on the last day of the world with the 
same body and the same features which I had during my 
lifetime. My daughter Hermonthis will last longer than a 
statue of bronze. 

"Then the last particles of yoiu* dust will have been 
scattered abroad by the winds, and even Isis herself, who 
was able to find the atoms of Osiris, would scarce be able 
to recomf)ense your being. 

"See how vigourous I yet remain, and how mighty is my 
grasp," he added, shaking my hand in the English fashion 
with a strength that btiried my rings in the flesh of my fin- 
gers. 

He squeezed me so hard that I awoke, and foimd my 
friend AJfred shaking me by the arm to make me get up. 

"Oh, you everlasting sleeper! Must I have you carried 
out into the middle of the street, and fireworks exploded in 
your ears? It is afternoon. Don't you recollect your prom- 
ise to take me with you to see M. Aguado's Spanish pic- 
tures?" 

"God I I forgot all, all about it," I answered, dressing my- 
self hurriedly. "We will go there at oyee. I have the permit 
lying there on my desk." 

I started to find it, but fancy my astonishment when I 
beheld, instead of the mimmiy's foot I had purchased the 
evening before, the little green paste idol left in its place by 
the Pi&cess Hermonthis! 



THE MARQUISE 

(La Marquise) 
By GEORGE SAND 

THE Marquise de R never said brilliant tbings 
although it is the fashion in French fiction to make 
every old woman sparkle with wit Her ignorance 
was extreme in all matters which contact with the world 
had not taught her, and she had none of that nicety of ex- 
pression, that exquisite penetration, that marvelous tact, 
which belong, it is said, to women who have seen all the 
different phases of life and society; she was blunt, heedless, 
and sometimes very cynical. She put to flight every idea 
I have formed concerning the noble ladies of the olden 
times, yet she was a genuine Marquise and had seen the 
Court of Louis XV. But as she was an exceptional char- 
acter, do not seek in her history for a study of the manners 
of any epoch. 

I found much pleasure in the society of the lady. She 
seemed to me remarkable for nothing much except her 
prodigious memory for the events of her youth and the mas- 
culine lucidity with which she expressed her reminiscences. 
For the rest, she was, like all aged p>ersons, forgetful of re- 
cent events and indifferent to ever3rthing in which she had not 
any presort personal concern. 

Her beauty had not been of that piquant order, which, 
though lacking in splendour and regularity, still gives 
pleasure in itself; she was not one of those women taught 
to be witty, in order to make as favorable an impression as 
those who are so by nature. The MaM)uise undoubtecQy 

Copyright, 1907. by P. F. Collier & Son. 

70 



GEORGE SAND 71 

had had the misfortune to be beautiful. I have seen her 
portrait, for, like all old women, she was vain enough to 
hang it up for inspection in her cipartments. She was rq>- 
resented in the character of a himtress nymph, with a low 
satin waist painted to imitate tiger-skin, sleeves of antique 
lace, bow of sandal-wood, and a crescent of pearl lighting 
up her hair. It was an admirable painting, and, above all, 
an admirable woman — tall, slender, dark, with black eyes, 
austere and noble features, imsmiUng, deep red lips, and 
hands which, it was said, had thrown tiae Princess de 
Lamballe into despair. Without lace, satin, or powder, she 
might indeed have seemed one of those beautiful, proud 
nymphs fabled to appear to mortals in the depth of the 
forest or upon the solitary mountam-sides, only to drive 
them mad with passion and regret. 

Yet the Marquise had made few acquaintances; accord- 
ing to her own account she had been thought dull and 
frivolous. The roufe of that time cared less for the charms 
of beauty than for the allwements of coquetry; women 
infinitely less admired than she had robbed her of all her 
adorers, and, strange enough, she had seemed indifferent 
to her fate. The little she told me of her life made me 
believe that her heart had had no youth, and that a cold 
selfishness had paralyzed all its faculties. Still, her old 
age was adorned by several sincere friends, and she gave 
alms without ostentation. 

One evening I foimd her even more communicative than 
usual; there was much of sadness in her voice. "My child," 
she said, "the Vicomte de Larrieux has just died of the gout. 
It is a great sorrow to me, for I have been his friend diese 
sixty years." 

"What was his age?" I asked. 

"Eighty-four. I am eighty, but not so infirm as he 
was, and I can hope to live Icmger. N'importe! Several of 
my friends have gone this year, and although I tell myself 
that I am yoimger and stronger than any of them, I can 
not help being frightened when I see my contemporaries 
dropping off around me." 

"And these," said I, "are the only regrets you fed for 



72 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

poor Larrieux, a man who worshipped you for sixty years, 
who never ceased to complain of your cruelty, yet never 
revolted from his allegiance? He was a model lover: there 
are no more such men." 

"My dear child," answered the Marquise, "I see that you 
think me cold and heartless. Perhaps you are right; judge 
for yourself. I will tell you my whole history, and, what- 
ever opinion you may have of me, I shall, at least, not die 
without having made myself known to some one. 

"When I was sixteen I left St. Cyr, where I had been 

educated, to marry the Marquis de R . He was fifty, 

but I dared not complain, for every one congratulated me 
on this splendid match, and all my portionless companions 
envied my lot. 

"I was never very bright, and at that time I was posi- 
tively stupid; the education of the cloister had completely 
benumbed my faculties. I left the convent with a roman- 
tic idea of life and of the world, stupidly considered a merit 
in young girls, but which often results in the misery of thdr 
whole lives. As a natural consequence, the experience 
brought me by my brief married life was lodged in so 
narrow a mind that it was of no use to me. I learned, 
not to understand life, but to doubt myself. 

"I was a widow before I was seventeen, and as soon 
as I was out of mourning I was surrounded by suitors. I 
was then in all the splendow of my beauty, and it was gen- 
erally admitted that there was neither face nor figure that 
could compare with mine; but my husband, an old, worn- 
out, dissipated man, who had never shown me anjrthing 
but irony and disdain, and had married me only to secure 
an office promised with my hand, had left me such an aver- 
sion to marriage that I could never be brought to contract 
new ties. In my ignorance of life I fancied that all men 
resembled him, and that in a second husband I should find 
M. de R 's hard heart, his pitiless irony, and that in- 
sulting coldness which had so deeply himiiliated me. 

"This terrible entrance into life had di^)elled for me all 
the illusions of youth. My heart, which perhaps was not 
entirely cold, withdrew into itself and grew su^idoos. I 



GEORGE SAND 73 

was foolish enough to tell my real feelings to several women 
of my acquaintance. They did not faU to tell what they 
had learned, and without considering the doubts and angui^ 
of my heart, boldly declared that I despised all men. 
There is nothing men will resent more readily than this; 
my lovers soon learned to despise me, and continued their 
flatteries only in the hope of finding an opportimity to 
hold me up to ridicule. I saw mockery and treachery writ- 
ten upon every forehead, and my misanthropy increased 
every day. About this time there came to Paris from the 
Provinces a man \^ho had neither talent, strength, nor fas- 
cination, but who ' possessed a frankness and uprightness 
of feeling very rare among the people with whom I lived. 
This was the Vicomte de Larrieux. He was soon acknowl- 
edged to be my most favoured lover. 

"He, poor fellow, loved me sincerely m his soul. His 
soul I Had he a soul? He was one of those hard, prosaic 
men who have not even the elegance of vice or the glitter 
of falsehood. He was struck only by my beauty; he took 
no pains to discover my heart. This was not disdain on 
his part, it was incapacity. Had he found in me the power 
of loving, he would not have known how to respond to it. 
I do not think there ever lived a man more wedded to 
material things than poor Larrieux. He ate with delight, 
and fell asleep in all the armchairs; the remainder of the 
time he took snuff. He was always occupied in satisfying 
some appetite. I do not think he had one idea a day. And 
yet, my dear friend, will you believe it? I never had the 
energy to get rid of him; for sixty years he was my torment 
Omstantly offended by my repulses, yet constantly drawn 
to me by the very obstacles I placed in the way of his pas- 
sion, he had for me the most faithful, the most undying, the 
most wearisome love that ever man felt for woman." 

"I am surprised," said I, "that in the course of your life 
you never met a man capable of understanding you, and 
worthy of converting you to real love. Must we conclude 
that the men of to-day are superior to those of other times?" 

"That would be a great piece of vanity on your part," 
she answered, smiling. "I have little reason to speak wdl 



74 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

of the men of my own time; yet I doubt, too, Aether 3^on 
have made much progress; but I will not moralize. The 
cause of my misfortime was entirely within mysdf. I had 
no tact, no jud[;ment. A woman as proud as I was should 
have possessed a superior character, and should have been 
able to distinguish at a glance many of the insipid, false, 
insignificant men who surroimded me. I was too ignorant, 
too narrovz-minded for this. As I lived on I acquired more 
judgment and have learned that several of the objects of my 
hatred desen ed far other feelings." 

"And wliile you were yoimg," I rejoined, "were you never 
tempted to make a second trial? Was this deqvrooted 
aversion never shaken off? It is strange." 

The Marquise was silent, then hastily laying her gold 
snuff-box on the table — "I have begun my confession," 
said she, "and I will acknowledge e\'erything. Listen. 
Once, 2md only once, I have loved, with a love as passion- 
ate and indomitable as it was imaginative and ideal. For 
you see, my child, you young men think you understand 
women, but you know nothing about them. If many old 
women cf eighty were occasionally to tell you the history 
of their loves, you v/ould perhaps find that the feminine sold 
contains sr^urces of good and evil of which you have no 
idea. And new, guess what was the rank of the man for 
whom I entirely lost my head — I, a Marquise, and prouder 
and hau":hticr than any other." 

"The King of France, or the Dauphin, Louis XIV." 

"Oh, if you go on in that manner, it will be three hours 
before you ccme to my lover. I prefer to tell you at once — 
he was an actor." 

"A king, notwithstanding, I imagine." 

"The nolDlest, the most elegant that ever trod the boards. 
You are not amazed?" 

"Not much. I have heard that such ill-sorted passions 
were not rare, even when the prejudices of caste in France 
were more powerful than they are to-day." 

"Those ill-sorted passions were not tolerated by the worid, 
I can assure you. The first time I saw him I expr«»ed 
my admiration to the Comtesse de Ferriers, who hiqipened 



GEORGE SAND 75 

to be beside me, and she answered: 'Do not speak so 
warmly to any one but me. You would be cruelly taunted 
were you suspected of forgetting that in the eyes of a 
woman of rank an actor can never be a man.' 

"Madame Ferriers's words remained in my mind, I know 
not why. At the time this contemptuous tone of hers 
seemed to me absurd, and this fear of committing myself a 
piece of malicious hypocrisy. 

"His name was Lelio; he was by birth an Italian, but 
^x)ke French admirably. He may have been thirty-five, 
although on the stage he often seemed less than twenty. 
He played Comeille; after this he played Racine, and in 
both he was admirable." 

"I am surprised," said I, interrupting the Marquise, "that 
his name does not appear in the annals of dramatic talent." 

"He was never famous," she answered, "and was appre- 
ciated neither by the court nor the town. I have heard 
that he was outrageously hissed when he first s^peared. 
Afterward he was valued for his feeling, his fire, and his 
efforts at correct elocution. He was tolerated and sometimes 
applauded, but, on the whole, he was always considered an 
actor without taste. 

"In those days tragedy was played 'properly'; it was 
necessary to die with taste, to fall gracefully, and to 
have an air of good breeding, even in ^e case of a blow. 
Dramatic art was modeled upon the usage of good society, 
and the diction and gestures of the actors were in harmony 
with the hoops and hair powder, which even then disfigured 
*Phedre.'* I have never appreciated the defects of this 
school of art. I bravely endured it twice in the week, for 
it was the fashion to like it; but I listened with so cold 
and constrained an air that it was generally said I was 
insensible to the charms of fine poetry. 

"One evening, after a rather long absence from Paris, I 
went to the Com6die Frangais to see *Le Cid.'t Ldio had 
been admitted to this theatre during my stay in the coun- 

♦**Phedre," by Pecine. 
t"Le Gd," by Comeille. 



76 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

try, and I saw him for the first time. He played Rodrique. 
I was deeply moved by the very first tone of his voice. It 
was penetrating rather than sonorous, but vibratmg and 
strongly accentuated. His voice was much criticized. That 
of the Cid was supposed to be deep and powerful, just as 
all the heroes of antiquity were supposed to be tall and 
strong. A king who was but five feet six inches could not 
wear the diadem; it would have been contrary to the decrees 
of tastes. Lelio was small and slender. His beauty lay 
not in the features, but in the nobleness of his fordiead, 
the irresistible grace of his attitude, the careless ease of his 
movements, the proud but melancholy expression of his 
face. The word charm should have been mventedforhim; 
it belonged to all his words, to all his glances, to all his 
motions. It was indeed a charm which he threw around 
me. This man, who stepped, spoke, moved without system 
or affectation, who sobbed with his heart as much as with 
his voice, who forgot himself to become identified with his 
passion; this man in whom the body seemed wasted and 
shattered by the soul, and a single one of whose glances 
contained all the life I failed to find in real life, exercised 
over me a really magnetic power. I alone could follow and 
understand him, and he was for five years my kind, my life, 
my love. To me he was much more than a man. His was 
an intellectual power which formed my soul at its will. 
Soon I was unable to conceal the impression he made on 
me. I gave up my box at the Com^die Franqaise in order 
not to betray myself. I pretended I had become pious, 
and in the evening I went to pray in the churches; instead 
of that I dressed myself as a working woman and mingled 
with the common people that I might listen to him uncon- 
strained. At last I bribed one of the employees of the 
theatre to let me occupy a little comer where no one could 
see me and which I reached by a side corridor. As an 
additional precaution I dressed myself as a schoolboy. 
When the hour for the theatre sounded in the large dodk 
in my drawing-room I was seized with violent palpitations. 
While my carriage was getting ready I tried to control my- 
self; and if Larrieux hs^pened to be with me I was rude 



GEORGE SAND 77 

to him, and threatened to send him away. I must have 
had great dissimulation and great tact to have hidden aU 
this for five years from Larrieux, the most jealous of men, 
and from all the malicious people about me. 

"I must tell you that instead of struggling against this 
passion I yielded to it with eagerness, with delight. It was 
so pure I Why should I have blushed for it? It gave 
me new life; it initiated me into all the feelings I had 
wished to experience; it almost made me a woman. I 
was proud to feel myself thrill and tremble. The first 
time my dormant heart beat aloud was to me a triumph. 
I learned to pout, to love, to be faithful and capricious. It 
was remarked I grew handsomer every day, that my dark 
eyes softened, that my smile was more expressive, that 
what I said was truer and had more meaning than could 
have been expected. 

"I have just told you that when I heard the clock strike 
I trembled with joy and impatience. Even now I seem 
to feel the delicious oppression which used to overwhelm 
me at the sound of that dock. Since then, through the 
vicissitudes of fortune, I have come to find myself very 
happy in the possession of a few small rooms in the Marais. 
Well, of all my magnificent house, my aristocratic faubourg, 
and my past splendour I regret only that which could have 
recalled to me those days of love and dreams. I have 
saved from the general ruin a few pieces of furniture which 
I look upon with as much emotion as if the hour for the 
theatre were about to strike now, and my horses were paw- 
ing at the door. Oh! my child, never love as I loved; it 
is a storm which death alone can quell. 

"Then I learned to take pleasure in being young, wealthy, 
and beautiful. Seated in my coach, my feet buried in furs, 
I could see myself reflected in the mirror in front of me. 
The dress of that time, which has since been so laughed 
at, was of extraordinary richness and splendour. When ar- 
ranged with taste and modified in its exaggeration, it en- 
dowed a beautiful woman with dignity, with a softness, the 
grace of which the portraits of that time could give you 
no idea. A woman, clothed in its panoply of feathers, of 



78 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

silks, and flowers, was obliged to move slowly. I have 
seen very fair woman in white robes with long trains of 
watered silk, their hair powdered and dressed with white 
plmnes, who might without exaggeration have been com- 
pared to swans. De^ite all Rousseau has said, those 
enormous folds of satin, that profusion of muslin which 
enveloped a slender little body as down envelops a dove, 
made us resemble birds, rather than wasps. Long wings 
of lace fell from our arms, and our ribbons, purses, and 
jewels were variegated with the most brilliant colours. Bal- 
ancing ourselves in our little high-heeled shoes, we seemed 
to fear to touch the earth and walked with the disdiunful 
circumspection of a little bird on the edge of a brook. 

"At the time of which I am speaking blonde powder began 
to be worn and gave the hair a light and soft colour. Tliis 
method of modifying the crude shades of the hair gave 
softness to the face, and an extraordinary brilliance to the 
eyes. The forehead was completely uncovered, its outline 
melted insensibly into the pale shades of the hsdr. It thus 
appeared higher and prouder, and gave all women a ma- 
jestic air. It was the fashion, too, to dress the hair low, 
with large curls thrown back and falling on the neck. This 
was very becoming to me, and I was celebrated for the 
taste and magnificence of my dress. I sometimes wore red 
velvet with grebe-skin, sometimes white satin edged with 
tiger-skin, sometimes lilac damask shot with silver, with 
white feathers and pearls in my hair. Thus attired I would 
pay a few visits until the hoiu" for the second piece at the 
theatre, for Lelio never came on in the first. I created 
a sensation wherever I appeared, and, when I again found 
myself in my carriage, I contemplated with mudi pleasure 
the reflected image of the woman who loved Lelio, and 
might have been loved by him. fejntil then, the only 
pleasure I had found in being beautiful lay in the jealousy 
I excited. But from the moment that I loved I began to 
enjoy my beauty for its own sake.y It was all I had to 
offer Lelio as a compensation for the triumphs which were 
denied him in Paris, and I loved to think of the pride and, 
joy this poor actor, so misjudged, so laughed at, would fed 



GEORGE SAND 79 

were he told that the Marquise de R had dedicated 

her heart to him. These the dreams, however, were as 
brief as they were beautiful. As soon as my thoughts as- 
sumed some consistency, as soon as they took the form of 
any plan whatever, I had the fortitude to suppress them, 
and all the pride of rank reasserted its empire over my 
soul. You seem surprised at this. I will explain it by and 

by. 

"About eight o'clock my carriage stopped at the little 
Church of the Carmelites nezx the Luxembourg, and I sent 
it away, for I was supposed to be attending the religious 
lectures which were given there at that hour. But I only 
crossed the church and the garden and came out on the other 
street. I went to the garret of the young needlewoman 
named Florence, who was devoted to me. I locked myself 
up in her room, and joyfully laid aside all my adornments 
to don the black square-cut coat, the sword and wig of 
a young college professor. Tall, with my dark complexion 
and inoffensive glances, I really had the awkward hypocrit- 
ical look of a little priestling who had stolen in to see the 
play. I took a hacloiey coach, and hastened to hide myself 
in my little box at the theatre. Then my joy, my terror, 
my trembling ceased. A profound calm came upon me 
and I remained until the raising of the curtain as if ab- 
sorbed in expectation of some great solemnity. 

"As the vulture in his h)^notic circling surrounds the 
partridge and holds him panting and motionless, so did the 
soul of Lelio, that great soul of a poet and tragedian, en- 
velop all my faculties, and plunge me into a torpor of 
admiration. I listened, my hands clasped upon my knees 
and my chin upon the front of the box, and my forehead 
bathed in perspiration; I hardly breathed; the crude light 
cf the lamps tortured my eyes, which, tired and burning, 
were fastened on his every gesture, his every step. His 
feigned motions, his simulated misfortune, impressed me 
as if they were real. I could hardly distinguish between 
truth and illusion. To me, Lelio was indeed Rodrigue, 
Bajazet, Hippolyte. I hated his enemies. I trembled at 
his dangers; his sorrows drew from me floods of tears, 



8o THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

and when he died I was compelled to stifle my emotions 
in my handkerchief. 

"Between the acts I sat down at the back of my box; 
I was as one dead imtil the meagre tone of the orchestra 
warned me that the curtain was about to rise again. Then 
I sprang up^ full of strength and ardour, the power to fed, 
to weep. How much freshness, poetry, and youth there was 
in that man's talent I That whole generation must have 
been of ice not to have fallen at his feet. 

"And yet, although he offended every conventional idea, 
although he could not adapt his taste to that silly public, 
although he scandalized the women by the carelessness of 
his dress and deportment, and displeased the men by his 
contempt for their foolish actions, there were moments when, 
by an irresistible fascination, by the power of his eye and 
his voice, he held the whole of this ungrateful public as if 
in the hollow of his hand, and compelled it to applaud and 
tremble. This happened but seldom, for the entire spirit 
of the age can not be suddenly changed; but when it did 
"happen, the applause was frantic. It seemed as if the 
Parisians, subjugated by his genius, wished to atone for all 
their injustice. As for me, I believed that this man had 
at most a supernatural power, and that those who most 
bitterly desnised him were compelled to swell his triumph 
in spite of themselves. In truth, at such times the Comddie 
Franqaise seemed smitten with madness, and the spectators, 
on leaving the theatre, were amazed to remember that they 
had applauded Lelio. As for me, I seized the opportunity 
to give full play to my emotion; I shouted, I wept, I pas- 
sionately called his name. Happily for me, my weak voice 
was drowned in the storm which rafi;ed about me. 

"At other times he was hissed when he seemed to me 
to be sublime, and then I left the theatre, my heart full 
of rage. Those niG:hts were tho most dangerous for me. 
I was violently tempted to seek him out, to weep with him, 
to curse the age in which we lived, and to console him by 
offering him my enthusiasm and love. 

"One evening as I left the theatre by the side passage 
which led to my box, a small, slender man passed in front of 



GEORGE SAND 8i 

me, and turned into the street. One of the stage-carpen- 
ters took of! his hat and said: 'Good evening, Monsieur 
Lelio.' Eager to obtain a nearer view of this extraordin- 
ary man, I ran after him, crossed the street and, forget- 
ting the danger to which I exposed myself, followed him 
into a cafe. Fortunately, it was not one in which I was 
likely to meet any one of my own rank. 

"When, by the li^t of the smoky lamp, I looked at 
Lelio, I thought I had been mistaken and had followed an- 
other man. He was at least thirty-five, sallow, withered, 
and worn out. He was badly dressed, he looked vulgar, 
spoke in a hoarse, broken voice, shook hands with the 
meanest wretches, drank brandy, and swore horribly. It 
was not until I had heard his name repeated several times 
that I felt sure that this was the divinity of the theatre, 
interpreter of the great Comeille. I could recognize none 
of those charms which had so fascinated me, not even his 
glance, so bright, so ardent, and so sad. His eyes were 
dull, dead, almost stupid; his strongly accentuated pro- 
nimciation seemed ignoble when he called to the waiter, or 
talked of gambling and taverns. He walked badly, he 
looked vulgar, and the paint was only half wiped from 
his cheeks. It was no longer Hippolyte — it was Lelio. 
The temple was empty; the oracle was dumb; the divinity 
had become a man, not even a man — an actor. 

"He went out, and I sat stupefied without even presence 
of mind enough to drink the hot spiced wine I had called 
for. When I remembered where I was, and perceived the 
insulting glances which were heaped upon me, I became 
frightened. It was the first time I had ever found myself 
in such an equivocal position, and in such immediate con- 
tact with people of that class. 

"I rose and tried to escape, but forgot to pay my reck- 
oning. The waiter ran after me; I was terribly ashamed; I 
was obliged to return, enter into explanations at the desk, 
and endure all the mocking and suspicious looks which 
were turned upon me. When I left I thought I was fol- 
lowed. In vain I looked for a hackney-coadi; there were 
none remaining in front of the theatre. I constantly heard 



82 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

heavy steps echoing my own. Trembling, I turned n^ head, 
and recognized a tall, ill-looking fellow whom I had no- 
ticed in one comer oif the caii, and who had very mudi 
the air of a ^y or something worse. He spoke to me; I 
do not know what he said; I was too much frightened to 
hear, but I had still presence of mind enough to rid myself 
of him. I struck him in the face with my cane, and, leav- 
ing him stunned at my audacity, I shot away swift as an 
arrow, and did not stop till I reached Florence's little 
garret. When I awoke the next morning in my own bed 
with its wadded curtains and coronal of pink feathers, I 
almost thought I had dreamed, and felt greatly mortified 
when I recollected the disillusions of the previous nig^t I 
thought myself thoroughly cured of my love, and I tried 
to rejoice at it, but in vain. I was filled with a mortal 
regret, the weariness of life again entered my heart, the 
world had not a pleasure which could charm me. 

^'Evening came, but brought no more benefidal emotions. 
Society seemed to me stupid. I went to church and listened 
to the evening lecture with a determination of becoming 
pious; I caught cold, and came home quite ill. I remained 
in bed severd days. The Comtesse de Ferriferes came to see 
me, assured me that I had no fever, that lying still made 
me ill, that I must amuse m3rself, go out, go to the theatre. 
She compelled me to go with her to see *Cinna.'* *Yott 
no longer go to the theatre,' said she to me; 'your health 
is undermined by your piety, and the dulness of your life. 
You have not seen Lelio for some time; he has improved, 
and he is now sometimes applauded. I think he may some 
day become very tolerable.' 

"I do not know why I allowed myself to be persuaded. 
However, as I was completely disenchanted with Ldio, 
I thought I no longer ran any risk in braving his fascina- 
tions in public. I dressed myself with excessive brilliance, 
and, in a court proscenium box, fronted a danger in ^^ch 
I no longer believed. 

''But tiie danger was never more imminent. Lelio was 

♦"Cinna," a tragedy by G>rneille. 



GEORGE SAND 83. 

sublime, and I had never been more in love with him. 
My recent adventure seemed but a dream. I could not 
believe that Lelio was other than he seemed upon the stage. 
In spite of myself, I yielded to the terrible agitations into 
whidi he had the power of throwing me. My face was 
bathed in tears, and I was compelled to cover it with my 
handkerchief. In the disorder of my mind I wiped off my 
rouge and my patches, and the Comtesse de Ferrieres ad- 
vised me to retire to the back of my box, for my emotion 
was creating a sensation in the house. I fortunately had 
had the skill to make every one believe it was the playing 
of Mdlle. Hippolyte Clairon which affected me so deeply. 
She was, in my own opinion, a very cold and formal actress, 
too superior perhaps for her profession, as it was then 
understood; but her manner of saying *Tout beau,' in 
*Cinna,' had given her a great reputation. It must be 
said, however, that when she played with Lelio she outdid 
herself. Although she took pains to proclaim her share 
in the fashionable contempt for his method of acting, she 
assuredly felt the influence of his genius. 

"That evening Lelio noticed me, either on account of 
my dress or my emotion; for I saw him, when he was not 
acting, bend over one of the spectators, who, at that epoch, 
sat upon the stage, and inquire my name. I guessed his 
question by the way both looked at me. My heart beat 
almost to suffocation, and I noticed during the play that 
Lelio's eyes turned several times toward me. What would 
I not have given to hear what the Chevalier de Bretillac, 
whom he had questioned, had said to him about me! Lelio's 
face did not indicate the nature of the information he 
had received, for he was obliged to retain the expression 
suited to his part. I knew this Bretillac very slightly, and 
I could not imagine whether he would speak well or ill 
of me. 

"That night I understood for the first time the nature 
of the passion which enchained me to Xelio. It was a 
passion purely intellectual^ purely idea l. (Jit was not he I 
kived, but those heroes of ancient times whose sincerity, 
whose fidelity, whose tenderness he knew how to portray^ 



84 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

with him and by him I was carried back to an epoch of 
forgotten virtues. I was bright enou^ to think that in 
those days I should not have been misjudged and hated, 
and that I should not have been reduced to loving a fantom 
of the footlights. Lelio was to me but the shadow of 
the Cid, the representative of that antique chivalric love 
now ridiculed in France. My Lelio was a fictitious being 
who had no existence outside the theatre. The illusions of 
the stage, the glare of the footlights, were a part of the 
being whom I loved. Without them he was nothing to me, 
and faded like a story before the brightness of day. I 
had no desire to see him off the boards; and should have 
been in despair had I met him. It would have been like 
contemplating the ashes of a great man. 

"One evening as I was going to the Carmelite church with 
the intention of leaving it by the passage door, I per- 
ceived that I was followed, and became convinced that 
henceforth it would be almost impossible to conceal ^he 
object of my nocturnal expeditions. I decided to go pub- 
licly to the theatre. Lelio saw me and watched me; my 
beauty had struck him, my sensibility flattered him. His 
attention sometimes wandered so mudi as to displease the 
public. Soon I could no longer doubt. He was madly 
in love with me. 

"My box had pleased the Princess de Vaudemont. I 
gave it up to her, and took for myself a smaller one, less 
in view of the house and better situated. I was almost 
upon the stage, I did not lose one of Lelio's glances; and 
he could look at me without its being seen by the public. 
But I no longer needed to catch his eye in order to under- 
stand all his feelings. The sound of his voice, his aighft, 
the expression which he gave to certain verses, certain 
words, told me that he was speaking to me. I was the 
happiest and proudest of women, for then it was the hero, 
not the actor, who loved me. 

"I have since heard that I^lio often followed me in my 
walks and drives; so little did I desire to see him outside of 
the theatre that I never p'^'-ceived it. Of the eighty years 



GEORGE SAND 85 

I have passed in this world, those five are the only ones 
in which I really lived. 

"One day I read in the 'Mercure de France' the name 
of a new actor engaged at the Com6die Frangaise to replace 
Lelio, who was about to leave France. 

"This announcement was a mortal blow to me. I could 
not conceive how I should exist when deprived of these 
emotions, this life of passion and storm. This event gave 
an immense development to my love, and was well-ni^ 
my ruin. 

"I no longer struggled with myself; I no longer sought 
to stifle all thoughts contrary to the dignity of my rank. 
I regretted that he was not what he appeared on the stage; 
I wished him as young and handsome as he seemed each 
night before the footli^ts, that I might sacrifice to him all 
my pride, all my prejudices. 

"While I was in this state of irresolution, I received a 
letter in an unknown hand. It is the only love letter I have 
ever kept. Thou^ Larrieux has written me innimierable 
protestations, and I have received a thousand perfumed 
declarations from a hundred others, it is the only real love 
letter that was ever sent me." 

The Marquise rose, opened with a steady hand an inlaid 
casket, and took from it a crumpled, worn-out letter, which 
I read with difficulty. 

"Madame — I am certain you will feel nothing but con- 
tempt for this letter, you will not even deem it worthy of 
your anger. But, to a man falling into an abyss, what 
matters one more stone at the bottom? You will think 
me mad, and you will be right. You will perhaps pity mc, 
for you will not doubt my sincerity. However humble your 
piety may have made you, you will understand the extent 
of my despair; you must already know how much evil and 
how much good your eyes can do. . . . 

"You must know this already, madame; it is impossible 
that the violent emotions I have portrayed upon the stage, 
my cries of wrath and despair, have not twenty times re- 
vealed to you my passion. You can not have lighted all 



86 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

these flames without being consdoas of ¥rhat yoa did. 
Perhaps you played with me as a tiger with his prey; per- 
haps the spectacle of my folly and my tortures was your 
pastime. But no; to think so were to presume too nnich. 
No, madame, I do not belie\'e it; you never thought of me. 
You felt the verses of the great Comeille, you identified 
these with the noble passions of tragedy; that was all. 
And I, madman that I was, I dared to think that my voice 
alone sometimes awoke your S3anpathies, that my heart 
echoed in yours, that between you and me there was scnne- 
thing more than between me and the public. Oh, my 
madness was arrant, but it was sweet! Leave me my illu- 
sions, madame; what are they to you? Do you fear that 
I should boast of them? By what right should I do so, and 
who would believe me? I should only make myself a 
laughing-stock of sensible people. Leave me this convic- 
tion; it has given me more joy than the severity of the 
public has caused me sorrow. Let me bless you, let me 
thank you upon my knees, for the sensibility which I have 
discovered in your soul, and which no one else has ever 
shown me; for the tears which I have seen you shed for 
my fictitious sorrows, and which have often raised my in- 
soiration almost to delirium; for the timid glances i^ch 
sought, at least it seemed so, to console me for the coldness 
of my audience. Oh, why were you bom to pomp and 
splendour! Why am I an obscure and nameless artist! 
Why have I not riches and the favour of the public, that I 
might exchange them for a name, for one of those titles 
which I have hitherto disdained, and which, perhaps, would 
permit me to aspire as high as you are placed! Once I 
deemed the distinctions conferred upon talent superior to 
all others. To what purpose, thought I, is a man a Cheva- 
lier or a Marquis but to be the sillier, the vainer, and the 
more insolent? I hated the pride of men of rank, and 
thought that I should be sufficiently avenged for their dis- 
dain if my genius raised me above them. Dreams and 
delusions all! My strength has not equalled my mad am- 
bition. I have remained obscure; I have done worse — ^1 
have touched success, and allowed it to escape me. I 



GEORGE SAND 87 

thought inlyself great, and I was cast down to the dust; I 
imagined that I was almost sublime, and I was condemned 
to be ridiculous. Fate took me — me and my audacious 
dreams — and crushed me as if I had been a reed. I am a 
most wretched man! But I committed my greatest folly 
when I cast my eyes beyond that row of lights which 
marked between me and the rest of society an invisible line 
of separation. It is to me a circle of Popilius. I, an actor, 
I dared to raise my eyes and fasten them upon a beautiful 
woman— upon a woman, young, lovely, and of high rank; for 
you are all this, madame, and I know it. The world ac- 
cuses you of coldness and of exaggerated piety. I alone 
understand you. Your first smile, your first tear, suffi- 
ciently disproved the absurd fable which Chevalier de 
BretiUac repeated against you. 

"But then what a destiny is yours! What fatality 
weighs upon you as upon me, that in the midst of society 
so brilliant, which calls itself so enlightened, you should 
have found only the heart of a poor actor to do you justice. 
Nothing will deprive me of the sad and consoling thought 
that, had we been bom in the same rank, you would have 
been mine in spite of my rivals, in spite of my inferiority. 
You would have been compelled to acknowledge that there 
is in me something greater than their wealt]^, and their 
titles — the power of loving you. Lelio." 

"This letter," continued the Marquise, "was of a char- 
acter very unusual at the time as was written, and seemed 
to me, notwithstanding some passages of theatrical decla- 
mation at the beginning, so powerful, so true, so full of 
only bold passion, that I was overwhelmed by it. The 
pride which still struggled within me faded away. I 
would have given all the remaining days I had to live one 
hour of such love. 
"I answered in these words, as nearly as I can remember: 
" *I do not accuse you, Lelio; I accuse destiny. I do not 
jHty you alone; I pity myself silso. Neither pride nor pru- 
doice shall m£^e me deny you the consolation of believing 
that I have felt a preference for you. Keep it, for it is the 



88 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

only one I can offer you. I can never consent to see you.' 
"Next day I received a note which I hastfly read and 
threw into the fire, to prevent Larrieux from seeing it, for 
he came suddenly upon me while I was reading it It 
read thus: 

" 'Madame — ^I must see you or I must die. Once— once 
only, but for a single hour, if such is your will. Why 
should you fear an interview since you trust my honour and 
my prudence. Madame, I know who you are; I am well 
aware of your piety and of the austerity of your life. I 
am not fool enough to hope for anything but a word of 
compassion, but it must fall from your own lips. My heart 
must receive it and bear it away, or my heart must break. 

Leuo.' 

"I believed implicitly in the humility, in the sincerity 
of Lelio. Besides, I had ample reason to trust my own 
strength. I resolved to see him. I had completely forgotten 
his faded features, his low-bred manners, his vulgar aspect; 
I recollected only the fascination of his genius, his letta^, 
and his love. I answered: 

" *I will see you. Find some secure place, but hope 
for nothing but for what you have asked. Should you seek 
to abuse my trust, you would be a villain, and I should 
not fear you.' 

"Answer: 

" 'Your trust would save you from the basest of villains. 
You will see, Madame, that Lelio is not imworthy of it 

Duke has often been good enough to offer me the 

use of his house in the Rue de Valois. Deign to go thither 
after the play.' 

"Some explanations and directions as to the locality ol 
the house followed. I received this note at four o'clock. 
The whole negotiation had occupied but a day. I had 
spent it in wandering through the house like one distracted; 
I was in a fever. This rapid succession of events bore me 
along as in a dream. 

"When I had made the final decision, when it was im- 



GEORGE SAND 89 

possible to draw back, I sank down upon my ottoman, 
breathless and dizzy. 

"I was really ill. A surgeon was sent for; I was bled. 
I told my servants not to mention my indisposition to 
any one; I dreaded the intrusion of officious advisers, and 
was determined not to be prevented from going out that 
night. 

"I threw myself upon my bed to await the appointed 
hour, and gave orders that no visitors should be achnitted. 
The blood-letting had relieved and weakened me; I sank 
into a great depression of ^irits. All my illusions van- 
ished with the excitement which had accompanied my 
fever. Reason and memory returned; I remembered my 
disenchantment in the coffee-house, and Lelio's wretched 
s^pearance there; I prepared to blush for my folly, and to 
fall from the height of my deceitful visions to a bare and 
despicable reality. I no longer understood how it had been 
possible for me to consent to exchange my heroic and ro- 
mantic tenderness for the revulsion of feeling which awaited 
me, and the sense of shame which would henceforth poison 
all my recollections. I bitterly regretted what I had done; I 
wept my illusions, my love, and that future of pure and 
secret joys which I was about to forfeit. Above all, I 
moiuned for Lelio, whom in seeing I should forever lose, in 
whose love I had found five years of happiness, and for 
whom in a few hours I should feel nothing but indifference. 

"In the paroxysm of my grief I violently wrung my arms; 
the vein reopened, and I had barely time to ring for my 
maid, who found me in a swoon in. my bed. A deep and 
heavy sleep, against which I struggled in vain, seized me. 
I neither dreamed nor suffered; I was as one dead for sev- 
eral hours. When I again opened my eyes my room was 
almost dark, my house silent; my waiting-woman was 
asleep in a chair at the foot of my bed. I remained for some 
time in such a state of numbness and weakness that I 
recollected nothing. Suddenly my memory returned, and 
I asked m3rself whether the hour and the day of rendezvous 
were passed, whether I had slept an hour or a century; 
wbsther I had killed Lelio by breaking my word. Was 



90 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

there yet time? I tried to rise, but my strength fafled me. 
I struggled for some moments as if in a nightmare. At 
last I summoned all the forces of my wilL I ^rang to the 
floor, opened the curtains, and saw the moon fining upon 
the trees of my garden. I ran to the dock; the hands 
marked ten. I seized my maid and waked her: 'Quinette, 
what day of the week is it?' She ^rang from her chair, 
screaming, and tried to escape from me, for she thought 
me delirious; I reassured her and learned that I had only 
slept three hours. I thanked God. I asked for a hack- 
ney-coach. Quinette looked at me in amazement At last 
she became convinced that I had the full use of my senses, 
transmitted my order, and began to dress me. 

^'I asked for my simplest dress; I put no ornaments in 
my hair, I refused to wear my rouge. I wished above aU 
things for Lelio's esteem and respect, for they were far 
more precious to me than his love. Nevertheless, I was 
pleased when Quinette, who was much surprised at this 
new caprice, said, examining me from head to foot: 'Truly, 
madame, I know not how you manage it. You are dressed 
in a plain white robe, without either train or pannier; you 
are ill and as pale as death; you have not even put on a 
patch; yet I never saw you so beautiful as to-nig^t I 
pity the men who will look upon you!' *Do you think me 
so very austere, my poor Quinette?' *Alas, madame, every 
day I pray Heaven to make me like you; but up to this 
time ' ^Come, simpleton, give me my mantle and muff.' 

"At midnight I was in the house of the Rue de Valois. 
I was carefully veiled, a sort of valet de chambre received 
me; he was the only human being to be seen in this mys- 
terious dwelling. He led me through the windings of a 
dark garden to a pavilion buried in silence and shadow. 
Depositing his green silk lantern in the vestibule, he opened 
the door of a large dusky room, showed me by a respiectful 
gesture and with a most impassive face a ray of ligjit pro- 
ceeding from the other extremity, and said, in a tone so 
low that it seemed as if he feared to awaken the sleeping 
echoes: ^Your ladvship is alone, no one else has yet come. 
Your ladyship will find in the summer parlor a bdl which 



GEORGE SAND 91 

I will answer if you need anything.' He disappeared as if 
by enchantment, shutting the door upon me. 

"I was terribly frightened; I thought I had fallen into 
some trap. I called him back. He instantly reappeared, 
and his air of stupid solemnity reassured me. I asked him 
what time it was, although I knew perfectly well, for I 
had sounded my watch twenty times in the carriage. It 
is midnight,' answered he, without raising his eyes. I 
now resolutely entered the summer parlor, and I realized 
how unfounded were my fears when I saw that the doors 
which opened upon the garden were only of painted silk* 
Nothing could be more (farming than this boudoir; it was 
fitted up as a concert-room. The walls were of stucco as 
white as snow, and the mirrors were framed in impolished 
silver. Musical instruments of imusually rich material 
were scattered about, upon seats of white velvet, trimmed 
with pearls. The li^t came from above through leaves of 
alabaster, which formed a dome. This soft, even light 
might have been mistaken for that of the moon. A single 
statue of white marble stood in the middle of the room; 
it was an antique and represented Isis veiled, with her fin- 
ger upon her lips. The mirrors which reflected us, both 
pale and draped in white, produced such an illusion upon 
me that I was obliged to distinguish my finger from hers. 

"Suddenly the silence was interrupted; the door was 
opened and dosed, and light foosteps sounded upon the 
floor. I sank into a diair more dead than alive, for I was 
about to see Lelio shorn of the illusions of the stage. I 
closed my eyes, and inwardly bade them farewell before I 
reopened them. 

"But how much was I surprised! Lelio was beautiful 
as an angel. He had not taken off his stage dress, and it 
was the most elegant I had ever seen him wear. His 
Spanish doublet was of white satin, his shoulder and garter 
knots of cherry ribbons, and a short cloak of the same 
colour was thrown over his shoulder. He wore an immense 
ruff of English lace; his hair was short and unpowdered, 
partially covered by a cap with white feather^ and 8 
diamond rose. In this costume he had just played Don 



92 THE GREAT MODERN PRMCB STORIES 

Juan in Testin de Pierre.' Never had I seen him so beau- 
tiful, so young, so poetical, as at that moment Vdasquez 
would have worshipped such a model. 

''He knelt before me. I could not help stretching out 
my hand to him, he seemed so submissive, so fearful of 
displeasing me. A man sufficiently in love to tremble be- 
fore a woman was rare in those times, and this one was 
thirty-five and an actor. 

"It seemed to me then, it seems to me still, that he 
was in the first bloom of youth. In his white dress he 
looked like a young page; his forehead had all the purity, 
his heart all the ardour of a first love. He took my hands 
and covered them with kisses. My senses seemed to desert 
me; I caressed his burning forehead, his stiff, black hair, 
and the brown neck which disappeared in the soft whiteness 
of his collar. He wept like a woman; I was overwhelmed 
with surprise. 

''I wept delicious tears. I compelled him to raise his 
head and look at me. How splendid, how tender were his 
eyes! How much fasdnation his warm, true soul com- 
mimicated to the very defects of his face, and the scars 
left upon it by time and toil! When I saw the premature 
wrinkles upon his beautiful forehead, when I saw the 
pallor of his lips, the languor of his smile, my heart was 
melted. I felt that I must needs weep for his griefs, his 
disappointments, the laboiu*s of his life. I dentified m3rself 
with him in all his sorrows, even that of his long, hopdess 
love for me, and I had but one wish — to compensate him 
for the ills he had suffered. 

"My dear Lelio, my great Rodrigue, my beautiful D(m 
Juan! He spoke to ipe, he told me how from a dissipated 
actor I had made him a man full of life and ardour; how 
I had raised him in his own eyes, and restored to him the 
illusions of his youth; he spoke of his respect, his venera- 
tion for me, of his contempt for the q)edes of love whicb 
Was then in fashion. Never did a man with more pene- 
trating eloquence speak to the heart of a woman; never 
did Racine make love utter itself with such conviction of 
tts own truths such poetry, such strength. Everything de- 



GEORGE SAND 93 

vated and profound, everything sweet and fiery which pas- 
sion can inspire, lay in his words, his face, his eyes, his ca- 
resses. Alas I did he deceive himself! Was he playing 
a part," 

"I certainly do not think so," I cried, looking at the Mar- 
quise. She seemed to grow yoimg as she spoke; and, like 
the fairy Urgela, to cast off her hundred years. I know not 
who has said that a woman's heart has no wrinkles. 

"Listen to the end," said she. "I threw my arms aroimd 
his neck; I shivered as I touched the satin of his coat, as I 
breathed the perfume of his hair. My emotion was too vio- 
lent and I fainted. 

"He recalled me to myself by his prompt assistance. I 
found him still kneeling at my feet. Tity me, kill me,' cried 
he. He was paler and far more ill than I. 

" ^Listen, Lelio,' said I. *Here we separate forever, but 
let us carry from this place a whole future of blissful 
thoughts and adored memories. I swear, Lelio, to love you 
till my death. I swear it without fear, for I feel that the 
snows of age will not have the power to extinguish this ard- 
ent flame.' Lelio knelt before me; he did not implore me, he 
did not reproach me; he said that he had not hoped for so 
much happiness as I had given him, and that he had no right 
to ask for more. Nevertheless, as he bade me farewell, his 
despair, the emotion which trembled in his face, terrified me. 
I asked him if he would not find happiness in thinking of 
me, if the ecstasy of our meeting would not lend its charm 
to all the days of his life, if his past and future sorrows 
would not be softened each time he recalled it. He roused 
himself to promise, to swear all I asked. He again fell at 
my feet and passionately kissed my dress. I made a sign 
and he left me. The carriage I had sent for came. 

"The automatic servant of the house knocked three times 
outside to warn me. Lelio despairingly threw himself in 
front of the door; he looked like a spectre. I gently repulsed 
him and he yielded. I crossed the threshold, and as he at- 
tempted to follow me, I showed him a chair in the middle 
of ihe room, underneath the statue of Isis. He sat down 
in it A passionate smile wandered over his lips, his eyes 



94 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

sent out one more flash of gratitude and love. He was still 
beautiful, still young, still a grandee of Spain. After a few 
st^ps, when I was about to lose him forever, I turned back 
and looked at him once more. Despair had crushed him. 
He was old, altered, frightful. His body seemed paralyzed. 
His stiffened lips attempted an muneaning smile. His eyes 
were glassy and dim; he was now only Lelio, the shadow of 
a lover and a prince." 

The Marquise paused; then, while her aspect changed like 
that of a ruin which totters and sinks, she added: "Since 
then I have not heard him mentioned." 

The Marquise made a second and a longer pause; then, 
with the terrible fortitude which comes with length of years, 
which springs from the persistent love of life or the near 
hope of death, she said with a smile: "Well, do you not 
now believe in the ideality of the ei^teenth century?" 



Z. MARCAS 

(Z. Marcos) 
By HONORE DE BALZAC 

I NEVER saw anybody, not even among the most remark- 
able men of the day, whose appearance was so striking 
as this. man's; the study of his countnance at first gave 
me a feeling of great melancholy, and at last produced an 
almost painful impression. 

There was a certain harmony between the man and his 
name. The Z. preceding Marcas, which was seen on the 
addresses of his letters, and which he never omitted from his 
signature, as the last letter of the alphabet, suggested some 
mysterious fatality. 

Marcas! say this two-syllabled name again and again; 
do you not feel as if it had some sinister meaning? Does 
it not seem to you that its owner must be doomed to martyr- 
dom? Though foreign, savage, the name has a right to be 
handed down to posterity; it is well constructed, easily pro- 
nounced, and has the brevity that beseems a famous name. 
Is it not pleasant as well as odd? But does it not sound 
tmfinished? 

I will not take it upon myself to assert that names have 
no influence on the destiny of men. There is a certain 
secret and inexplicable concord or a visible discord betweai 
the events of a man's life and his name which is truly sur- 
prising; often some remote but very real correlation is re- 
vealed. Our globe is round; everj^ing is linked to every- 
thing else. Some day perhaps we shall revert to the occidt 
sciences. 

Translated by Ellen Marriage. 

9S 



96 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Do you not discern in that letter Z an adverse influence? 
Does it not prefigure the wayward and fantastic progress of 
a storm-tossed life? What wind blew on that letter, which, 
whatever language we find it in, begins scarcely fifty words? 
Marcas' name was Zephirin; Saint Zephirin is hi^y ven- 
erated in Brittany, and Barcas was a Breton. 

Study the name once more: Z. Marcas! The man's 
whole life lies in this fantastic juxtaposition of seven letters; 
seven I the most significant of all the cabalistic numbers. 
And he died at five-and-thirty, so his life extended over seven 
lustres. 

Marcas! Does it not hint of some precious object that is 
broken with a fall, with or without a crash? 

I had finished studying the law in Paris in 1836. I lived 
at that time in the Rue Comeille in a house where none but 
students came to lodge, one of those large houses where there 
is a winding staircase quite at the back, lighted below from 
the street, higher up by borrowed lights, and at the top by 
a skylight. There were forty furnished rooms — furnished 
as students' rooms are! What does youth demand more 
than was here supplied? A bed, a few chairs, a chest of 
drawers, a looking-glass, and a table. As soon as the sky 
is blue the student opens his window. 

But in this street there are no fair neighbours to flirt with. 
In front is the Odeon, long since closed, presenting a wall 
that is beginning to go black, its tiny gallery windows and 
its vast expanse of slate roof. I was not rich enough to have 
a good room; I was not even rich enough to have a room 
to myself. Juste and I shared a double-bedded room on 
the fifth floor. 

On our side of the landing there were but two rooms — 
ours and a smaller one, occupied by Z. Marcas, our neigh* 
bour. For six months Juste and I remained in perfect ig- 
norance of the fact. The old woman who managed the house 
had indeed told us that the room was inhabited, but she had 
added that we should not be disturbed, that the occupa^^t 
was exceedingly quiet. In fact those six months, ^ '^ 
never met our fellow-lodger, and we never heard a soimd 



HONORS DE BALZAC gf 

in his room, in ^ite of the thinness of the partition that 
divided us — one of those walls of lath and plaster whidi are 
common in Paris houses. 

Our room, a little over seven feet high, was himg with a 
vile cheap paper sprigged with blue. The floor was painted, 
and knew nothing of the polish given by the frotteur*s bnidi. 
By our beds there was only a scrap of thin carpet. The 
diimney opened immediately to the roof, and smoked so 
abominably that we were obliged to provide a stove at oiu* 
own expense. Chir beds were mere painted wooden cribs 
like those in schools; on the chimney shelf there were but 
two brass candlesticks, with or without tallow candles in 
them, and our two pipes with some tobacco in a pouch or 
strewn abroad, also the little piles of dgar-ash left there 
by our visitors or ourselves. 

A pair of calico ciu'tains hung from the brass window rods, 
and on each side of the window was a small bookcase in 
cherry-wood, such as every one knows who has stared into 
the shop windows of the Quartier Latin, and in which we 
kept the few books necessary for our studies. 

The ink in the inkstand was always in the state of lava 
congealed in the crater of a volcano. May not any ink- 
stand nowadays become a Vesuvius? The pens, all twisted, 
served to clean the stems of our pipes; and, in opposition to 
all the laws of credit, paper was even scarcer than coin. 

How can young men be expected to stay at home in sudi 
furnished lodgings? The students studied in the caf6s, the 
theatre, the Luxembourg gardens, in grisettes* rooms, even in 
the law schools — anywhere rather than in their horrible 
rooms — horrible for purposes of study, delightful as soon 
as they are used for gossiping and smoldng in. Put a doth 
on the table, and the impromptu dinner sent in from the 
best eating-house in the ndghbourhood — ^places for four — 
two of them in petticoats — show a lithograph of this "Lite- 
rior" to the veriest bigot, and she will be bound to smile. 

We thought only of amusing ourselves. The reason for 
our dissipation lay in the most serious facts of the politics 
of the time. Juste and I could not see any room for us 
in the two professions our parents wished us to take up. 



98 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

There are a hundred doctors, a hundred lawyers, for one that 
is wanted. The crowd is choking these two paths which are 
supposed to lead to fortune, but which are merely two 
arenas; men kill each other there, fighting, not indeed with 
swords or firearms, but with mtrigue and calumny, with tre- 
mendous toil, campaigns in the sphere of the intellect as 
murderous as those in Italy were to the soldiers of the Re- 
public. In these days, when ever3rthing is an intellectual- 
competition, a man must be able to sit forty-ei^t hours 
on end in his chair before a table, as a General could re- 
main for two days on horseback and in his saddle. 

The throng of aspirants has necessitated a division of the 
Faculty of Medicine into categories. There is the ph3rsidan 
who writes and the physician who practises, the political phy- 
sician, and the physician militant — four different ways of 
being a physician, four classes already filled up. As to the 
fifth class, that of physicians who sell rem^es, there is 
such a competition that they fight each other with disgusting 
advertisements on the walls of Paris. 

In all the law courts there are almost as many lawyers 
as there are cases. The pleader is thrown back on jour- 
nalism, on politics, on literature. In fact, the State, be- 
sieged for the smallest appointments under the law, has 
ended by requiring that the applicants should have some 
little fortune. The pear-shaped head of the grocer's son is se- 
lected in preference to the square skull of a man of talent 
who has not a sou. Work as he will, with all his energy, a 
yoimg man, starting from zero, may at the end of ten years 
find himself below the point he set out from. In these days, 
talent must have the good luck which secures success to the 
most incapable; nay, more, if it scorns the base compromises 
which insure advancement to crawling mediocrity, it will 
never get on. 

If we thoroughly knew our time, we also knew ourselves, 
and we preferred the indolence of dreamers to aimless stir, 
easy-going pleasure to the useless toil which would have ex- 
hausted our courage and worn out the edge of our intelli- 
gence. We had anal3rzed social life while smoking, laugh- 
ing, and loafing. But, though elaborated by such means 



HONORS DE BALZAC 99 

as these, our reflections were none the less judicious and 
profound. 

While we were fully conscious of the slavery to which 
youth is condemned, we were amazed at the brutal indiffer- 
ence of the authorities to everything connected with intellect, 
thou^t, and poetry. How often have Juste and I exchanged 
glances when reading the papers as we studied political 
events, or the debates in the Chamber, and discussed the 
proceedings of a Coiurt whose wilful ignorance could find 
no parallel but in the platitude of the coiurtiers, the mediocrity 
of the men forming the hedge round the newly-restored 
throne, all alike devoid of talent or breadth of view, of dis- 
tinction or learning, of influence or dignity! 

Could there be a higher tribute to the coiurt of Charles X. 
than the present Court, if Court it may be called? What a 
hatred of the country may be seen in the naturalization of 
vulgar foreigners, devoid of talent, who are enthroned in the 
Chamber of Peers! What a perversion of justice! What an 
insult to the distinguished youth, the ambitions native to the 
soil of France ! We looked upon these things as upon a spec- 
tacle, and groaned over them, without taking upon oiu:- 
selves to act. 

Juste, whom no one ever sought, and who never sought 
any one, was, at five-and-twenty, a great politician, a man 
with a wonderful aptitude for apprehending the correlation 
between remote history and the facts of the present and of 
the future. In 1831, he told me exactly what would and 
did happen — the murders, the conspiracies, the ascendency of 
the Jews, the difficulty of doing axiyihing in France, the 
scarcity of talent in the hi^er circles, and the abundance of 
intellect in the lowest ranks, where the finest coiurage is 
snothered under cigar ashes. 

What was to become of him? His parents wished him to 
be a doctor. But if he were a doctor, must he not wait 
twenty years for a practice? You know what he did? No? 
Well, he is a doctor; but he left France, he is in Asia. 
At this moment he is perhaps sinking under fatigue in a 
desert, or dying of the lashes of a barbarous horde— or 
perhaps he is some Indian prince's prime minister. 



100 THE GREAT MODERN FREVCH STORIES 

• 

Action is my vocation. Leaving a civil college at the agio 
of twenty, the only way for me to enter the anny was by en- 
listing as a common soldier; so, weary of the dismal outlook 
that lay before a lawyer, I acquired the knowledge needed 
for a sailor. I imitate Juste, and keep out of France, where 
men waste, in the struggle to make way, the energy needed 
for the noblest works. Follow my example, friends; I am 
going where a man steers his destiny as he pleases. 

These great resolutions were formed in the little room in 
the lodging-house in the Rue Comeille, in spite of our haunt- 
ing the Bal Musard, flirting with girls of the town, and lead- 
ing a careless and apparently reckless life. Our plans and 
arguments long floated in the air. 

Marcas, our neighbour, was in some degree the guide who 
led us to the margin of the precipice or the torrent, who 
made us sound it, and showed us beforehand what our fate 
would be if we let ourselves fall into it. It was he who 
put us on our guard against the time-bargains a man makes 
with poverty under the sanction of hope, by accepting pre- 
carious situations whence he fights the battle, carried along 
by the devious tide of Paris — that great harlot who takes 
you up or leaves you stranded, smiles or turns her back 
on you with equal readiness, wears out the strongest will in 
vexatious waiting, and makes misfortime wait on chance. 

At our first meeting, Marcas, as it were, dazzled us. On 
our return from the schools, a little before the dinner-hour, 
we were accustomed to go up to our room and remain there 
a while, either waiting for the other, to learn whether there 
were any change in our plans for the evening. One day, 
at four o'clock, Juste met Marcas on the stairs, and I saw 
him in the street. It was in the month of November, and 
Marcas had no cloak; he wore shoes with heavy soles, cor- 
duroy trousers, and a blue double-breasted coat buttoned 
to the throat, which gave a military air to his broad chest, 
all the more so because he wore a black stock. The cos- 
tume was not in itself extraordinary, but it agreed well with 
the man's mien and coimtenance. 

My first impresaon on seeing him was neither surprise, 



. HONORS DE BALZAC loi 

nor distress, nor interest, nor pity, but curiosity mingled with 
all these feelings. He walked slowly, with a step that be- 
trayed deep melancholy, his head forward with a stoop, but 
not bent like that of a conscience-stricken man. That head, 
large and powerful, which might contain the treasures neces- 
sary for a man of the highest ambition, looked as if it were 
loaded with thought; it was weighted with grief of mind, 
but there was no touch of remorse in his expression. As to 
his face, it may be summed up in a word. A common super- 
stition has it ^at every human countenance resembles som6 
animal. The animal for Marcas was the lion. His hair was 
like a mane, his nose was short and fiat; broad and dented 
at the tip like a lion's; his brow, like a lion's, was strongly 
marked with a deep median furrow, dividing two powerf^ 
bosses. His high, hairy cheek-bones, all the more promi- 
nent because his cheeks were so thin, his enormous mouth 
and hollow jaws, were accentuated by lines of haughty sig- 
nificance, and marked by a complexion full of tawny sha- 
dows. This almost terrible countenance seemed illimiinated 
by two lamps — two eyes, black indeed, but infintely sweet, 
cahn smd deep, full of thought. If I may say so, those eyes 
had a humiliated expression. 

Marcas was afraid of looking directly at others, not for 
himself, but for those on whom his fascinating gaze might 
rest; he had* a power, and he shunned using it; he would 
^are those he met, and he feared notice. This was not 
from modesty, but from resignation — ^not Christian resigna- 
tion, which implies charity, but resignation founded on rea- 
son, which had demonstrated the immediate inutility of his 
gifts, the impo^bility of entering and living in the sphere 
for which he was fitted. Those eyes could at times flash 
lightnings. From those lips a voice of thimder must surely 
proceed; it was a mouth like Mirabeau's. 

"I have seen such a grand fellow in the street," said I to 
Juste on coming in. 

"It must be our neighbour," replied Juste, who described, 
in fact, the man I had just met. "A man who lives like a 
wood-louse would be siu-e to look like that," he added. 

"What dejection and what dignity!" 



102 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"One is the consequence of flie other." 

"What ruined hopes! What schemes and failures!" 

"Seven leagues of ruins! Obelisks — ^palaces — towersl — 
The ruins of Palmyra in the desert!" said Juste, laug^g. 

So we called him the Ruins of Palmyra. 

As we went out to dine at the wretched eating-house in 
the Rue de la Harpe to which he subscribed, we asked the 
name of Number 37, and then heard the weird name Z. 
Marcas. Like boys, as we were, we repeated it more than a 
hundred times with all sorts of comments, absurd or melan- 
choly, and the name lent itself to the jest. Juste would 
fire off the Z like a rocket rising, z-z-z-z-zed; and after pro- 
nouncing the first syllable of the name with great importance, 
depicted a fall by tiie dull brevity of the second. 

"Now, how and where does die man live?" 

From this query, to the innocent espionage of curio^ty 
there was no pause but that required for the carrying out our 
plan. Instead of loitering about the streets, we both came 
in, each armed with a novel. We read with our ears open. 
And in the perfect silence of our attic rooms, we heard the 
even, dull sound of a sleeping man breathing. 

"He is asleep," said I to Juste, noticing this fact 

"At seven o'clock!" replied the Doctor. 

This was the name by which I called Juste, and be called 
me the Keeper of the Seals. 

"A man must be wretched indeed to sleep as much as our 
neighbour!" cried I, jumpmg on to the chest of drawers with 
a knife in my hand, to which a corkscrew was attached. 

I made a round hole at the top of the partition, about as 
big as a five-sou piece. I had forgotten that there would be 
no light in the room, and on putting my eye to the hole, I 
saw only darkness. At about one in the morning, when wc 
had finished our books and were about to undress, we heard 
a noise in our nei?;hbour's room. He got up, struck a match, 
and lighted his dip. I got on to the drawers again, and I 
then saw Marcas seated at his table and copying law-papers. 

His room was about half the size of ours; the bed stood in 
a recess by the door, for the passage ended there, and its 
breadth was added to his garret; but the (round on wii^ 



HONOR& DE BALZAC 103 

the house was built was evidently irregular, for the party-wall 
formed an obtuse angle, and the room was not square. There 
was no fireplace, only a small earthenware stove, white 
blotched with green, of which the pipe went up through the 
roof. The window, in the skew side of the room, had 
shabby red curtains. The furniture consisted of an arm- 
chair, a table, a chair, and a wretched bed-table. A cup- 
board in the wall held his clothes. The wall-paper was 
horrible; evidently only a servant had ever lodged there 
before Marcas. 

"What is to be seen?" asked the Doctor as I got down. 

"Look for yourself," said I. 

At nine next morning, Marcas was in bed. He had 
breakfasted off a saveloy; we saw on a plate, with some 
crumbs of bread, the remains of that too familiar delicacy. 
He was asleep; he did not wake till eleven. He then set 
to work again on the copy he had begun the night before, 
which was lying on the table. 

On going downstairs we asked the price of that room, and 
were told fifteen francs a month. 

In the course of a few days, we were fully informed as to 
the mode of life of Z. Marcas. He did cop5dng, at so much 
a sheet no doubt, for a law-writer who lived in the courtyard 
of the Sainte-Chapelle. He worked half the night; after 
sleeping from six tiH ten, he began again and wrote till 
three. Then he went out to take the copy home before 
dinner, which he ate at Mizerai's in the Rue Michel-le- 
Comte, at a cost of nine sous, and came in to bed at six 
o'clock. It became known to us that Marcas did not utter 
fifteen sentences in a month; he never talked to anybody, 
nor said a word to himself in his dreadful garret. 

"The Ruins of Palmyra are terribly silent I" said Juste. 

TTiis taciturnity in a man whose appearance was so im- 
posing was strangely significant. Sometimes when we met 
him, we exchanged glances full of meaning on both sides, 
but they never led to any advances. Insensibly this man 
became the object of our secret admiration, though we knew 
no reason for it. Did it lie in his secretly simple habits, his 
nxmastic regularity, his hermit-like frugarity, his idiotically 



104 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

mechanical labour, allowing his mind to remain neuter or to 
work on its own lines, seeming to us to hint at an e]q)ecta- 
tion of some stroke of good luck, or at some foregone con- 
dusion as to his life? 

After wandering for a long time among the Ruins of 
Palmyra, we forgot them — we were young! Then came the 
Carnival, the Paris Carnival, which, henceforth, will edqise 
the old Carnival of Venice, unless some ill-advised Prefect 
of Police is antagonistic. 

Gambling ought to be allowed during the Carnival; but 
the stupid moralists who have had gambling suppressed are 
inert financiers, and this indispensable evfl wQl be re-estab- 
lished among us when it is proved that France leaves mil- 
lions at the German tables. 

This splendid Carnival brought us to utter penury^ as it 
does every student. We got rid of every object of luxury; 
we sold our second coats, our second boots, our second waist- 
coats — everything of which we had a duplicate, excqpt our 
friend. We ate bread and cold sausages; we looked where 
we walked; we had set to work in earnest We owed two 
months' rent, and were sure of having a bill from the porter 
for sixty or eighty items each, and amoimting to forty or 
fifty francs. We made no noise, and did not laugh as we 
crossed the little hall at the bottom of the stairs; we com- 
monly took it at a flying leap from the lowest stq> into the 
street. On the day when we first found ourselves bereft of 
tobacco for our pipes, it struck us that for some days we 
had been eating bread without any kind of butter. 

Great was qur distress. 

"No tobacco!" said the Doctor. 

"No cloak!" said the Keeper of the Seals. 

"Ah, you rascals, you would dress as the postOlon de 
Longjumeau, you would appear as Ddbardeurs, sup in the 
morning, and breakfast at night at Vary's — sometimes even 
at the Rocher de Cancale. — Dry bread for you, my boys! 
Wliy," said I, in a big bass voice, "you deserve to sleq> under 
the bed, you are not worthy to lie in it ** 

"Yes, yes; but. Keeper of Seals^ there is no moie to- 
bacco!" said Juste. 



HONOR& DB BALZAC 105 

*?t is high time to write home, to our aimts, our mothers^ 
and our sisters, to tell them we have no underlinen left, that 
the wear and tear of Paris would ruin garments of wire. 
Then we will solve an elegant chemical problem by trans^ 
muting linen into silver." 

"But we must live till we get the answer." 

"Well, I will go and bring out a loan among such of our 
friends as may still have some capital to invest." 

"And how much ^il you find?" 

"Say ten francs I" replied I with pride. 

It was midnight. Marcas had heard ever3rthing. He 
knocked at our door. 

"Messieurs," said he, "here is some tobacco; you can 
rq^ay me on the first opportimity." 

We were struck, not by the offer, which we accepted, but 
by the rich, deep, full voice in whidi it was made; a tone 
only comparable to the lowest string of Paganini's violin. 
Marcas vanished without waiting for our thanks. 

Juste and I looked at each other without a word. To be 
rescued by a man evidently poorer than ourselves! Juste 
sat down to write to every member of his family, and I went 
ofif to effect a loan. I brought in twenty francs lent me by 
a fellow-provincial. In Aat evil but happy day gambling 
was still tolerated, and in its lodes, as hard as the rocky ore 
of Brazil, young men, by risking a small sum, had a chance 
of winning a few gold pieces. My friend, too, had some 
Turkish tobacco brought home from Constantinople by a 
sailor, and he gave me quite as much as we had taken from 
Z. Marcas. I conveyed the ^lendid cargo into port, and 
we went in triimiph to repay our neighbour with a tawny wig 
of Turkish tobacco for his dark Caporal. 

"You are determined not to be my debtors," said he. 
*Trou are giving me gold for copper. — ^You are boys — good 
boys " 

The sentences, spoken in varjring tones, were varioudy 
emphasized. The words were nottiing, but Ae expression! — 
That made us friends of ten years' standing at once. 

Marcas, on hearing us coming, had covered up his papers; 
we understood that it would be taking a liberty to allude to 



io6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

his means of subsistence, and felt a^amed of having watdied 
him. His cupboard stood open; in it there were two shirts, 
a white necktie, and a razor. The razor made me shudder. 
A looking-glass, worth five francs perhaps, hung near the 
window. 

The man's few and simple movements had a sort of savage 
grandeur. The Doctor and I looked at each other, won- 
dering what we could say in reply. Juste, seeing that I 
was speechless, asked Marcas jestingly: 

"You cultivate literature. Monsieur?" 

"Far from it I" replied Marcas. "I should not be so 
wealthy." 

"I fancied," said I, "that poetry, alone, in these days, 
was amply sufficient to provide a man with lodgings as bad 
as ours." 

My remark made Marcas smile, and the smile gave a 
charm to his yellow face. 

"Ambition is not a less severe taskmaster to those yAio 
fail," said he. "You, who are beginning life, walk in the 
beaten paths. Never dream of rising superior, you will 
be ruined!" 

"You advise us to stay just as we are?" said the Doctor, 
smiling. 

There is something so infectious and childlike in the 
pleasantries of youth, that Marcas smiled again in rq)ly. 

"What incidents can have given you this detestable phOos' 
ophy?" asked I. 

"I forgot once more that chance is the result of an immense 
equation of which we know not all the factors. When we 
start from zero to work up to the unit, the chances are in- 
calculable. To ambitious men Paris is an immense roulette 
table, and every young man fancies he can hit on a successful 
progression of numbers." 

He offered us the tobacco I had brought that we mi^t 
smoke with him; the Doctor went to fetch our pipes; Marcas 
filled his, and then he came to sit in our room, bringing the 
tobacco with him, since there were but two chairs in his. 
Juste, as brisk as a squirrel, ran out, and returned with a 



HONOR& DE BALZAC 107 

boy carrying three bottles of Bordeaux, some Brie cheese, 
and a loaf. 

"Hah I" said I to myself, "fifteen francs," and I was right 
to a sou. 

Juste gravely laid five francs on the chimney-shdf. 

There are immeasurable differences between the grega- 
rious man and the man who lives closest to nature. Toussaint 
Louverture, after he was caught, died without speaking a 
word. Napoleon, transplanted to a rock, talked like a 
magpie — ^he wanted to account for himself. Z. Marcas 
erred in the same way, but for our benefit only. Silence 
in all its majesty is to be found only in the savage. There 
never is a criminal who, though he might let his secrets 
fall with his head into the basket of sawdust, does not fed 
the purely social impulse to tell them to somebody. 

Nay, I am wrong. We have seen one Iroquois of the Fau- 
bourg Saint-Marceau who raised the Parisian to the levd 
of the natural savage — a republican, a conspirator, a French- 
man, an old man, who outdid all we have heard of Negro 
determination, and all that Cooper tells us of the tenadty 
and coolness of the Redskins imder defeat. Morey, the 
Guatimozin of the "Mountain," preserved an attitude un- 
paralleled in the annals of Eiuropean justice. 

This is what Marcas told us during the small hours, sand- 
wiching his discourse with slices of bread spread with cheese 
and washed down with wine. All the tobacco was burned 
out. Now and then the hackney coaches dattering across 
the Place de TOdeon, or the omnibuses toiling past, sent up 
their dull rumbling, as if to remind us that Paris was still 
dose to us. 

His family lived at Vitr^; his father and mother had fif- 
teen hundred francs a year in the fimds. He had recdved 
an education gratis in a Seminary, but had refused to enter 
the priesthood. He felt in hinl^lf the fires of immense 
ambition, and had come to Paris on foot at the age of twenty, 
the possessor of two hundred francs. He had studied the 
law, working in an attorney's office, where he had risen to 
be siq)erior derk. He had taken his doctor's degree in law. 



io8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

had mastered the old and modem codes, and could hold hb 
own with the most famous pleaders. He had studied the 
law of nations, and was familiar with European treaties and 
international practice. He had studied men and things in 
five capitals — ^London, Berlin, Vienna, Petersburg, and Con- 
stantinople. 

No man was better informed than he as to the rules of 
the Chamber. For, five years he had been reporter of the 
debates for a daily paper. He ^x)ke extempore and admir- 
ably, and could go on for a long time in that deep, a{^)eal- 
ing voice which had struck us to the soul. Indeed, he proved 
by the narrative of his life that he was a great orator, a 
he resembled Berryer in his fervour and in the impetus which 
commands the S3mipathy of the masses, and was like Thiers 
in refinement apd skill; but he would have been less diffuse, 
less in difficulties for a conclusion. He had intended to rise 
rapidly to power without burdening himself first with the 
doctrines necessary to begin with, for a man in opposition, 
but an incubus later to the statesman. 

Marcas had learned everything that a real statesman 
should know; indeed, his amazement was considerable when 
he had occasion to discern the utter ignorance of men who 
have risen to the administration of public affairs in France. 
Though in him it was vocation that hed led to study, nature 
had been generous and bestowed all that cannot be ac- 
quired — keen perceptions, self-command, a nimble wit, rapid 
judgment, decisiveness, and, what is the genius of these 
men, fertility in resource. 

By the time when Marcas thought himself duly equi[^)ed, 
France was torn by intestine divisions arising from the tri- 
umph of the House of Orleans over the elder branch of the 
Bourbons. 

The field of political warfare is evidently changed. Civfl 
war henceforth cannot last for long, and will not be fou^t 
out in the provinces. In France such struggles will be of 
brief duration and at the seat of government; and the battle 
will be the close of the moral contest which will have been 
brought to an issue by superior minds. This state of things 
wU continue so long as France has her present singular 



HONOR& DE BALZAC 109 

form of government, which has no analogy with that of any 
other country; for there is no more resemblance between the 
Ejiglish and the French constitutions than between the two 
lands. 

Thus Marcas' place was in the political press. Bemg poor 
and unable to secure his election, he hoped to make a sudden 
appearance. He resolved on making the greatest possible 
sacrifice for a man (>i superior intellect, to work as subor- 
dinate to some rich and ambitious deputy. Like a second 
Bonaparte, he sought his Barras; the new Colbert hoped to 
find a Mazarin. He did immense services, and he did them 
then and there; ho assumed no importance, he made no boast, 
lie did not complain of ingratitude. He did them in the hope 
that his patron would put him in a position to be elected 
deputy; Marcas wished for nothing but a loan that mi^t 
enable him to purchase a house in Paris, the qualification re- 
quired by law. Richard III asked for nothing but his horse. 

In three years Marcas had made his man — one of the 
fifty supposed great statesmen who are the battledores with 
which two cunning players toss the ministerial portfolios 
exactly as the man behind the puppet-show hits Punch 
against the constaLl^ in lis street iieatre, and counts on 
always getting paid. This man existed only by Marcas, 
but he lad just braii.j enough ) appreciate the value of his 
"ghost" and . ) knt .; that Marcas, if 'j ever came to the 
front, would remain there, would b mdispensable, whUe he 
himself would be translated to the polar zone of the Luxem- 
bourg. So he determined to put insurmountable obstacles 
in the way of his Mentor's advancement and hid his pur- 
pose imder the semblance of the utmost sincerity. Like all 
mean men he could dissimulate to perfection and he soon 
made progress in the ways of ingratitude, for he felt that he 
must kill Marcas, not to be killed by him. These two men, 
apparently so united, hated each other as soon as one had 
once deceived the other. 

The politician was made one of a ministry; Marcas re- 
mained in the opposition to hinder his man from being at- 
tacked; nay, by skilful tactics he won him the applause of the 
c^^sition. To excuse himself for not rewarding his subal- 



no THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

tern, the chief pointed out the impossibility of finding a 
place suddenly for a man on the other side, without a great 
deal oi. manoeuvring. Marcas had hoped confidently for a 
place to enable him to marry, and thus acquire the quali- 
fication he so ardently desired. He was two-and-thirty, and 
the Chamber ere long must be dissolved. Having detected 
his man in this flagrant act of bad faith, he overthrew him, 
or at any rate contributed largely to his overthrow, and 
covered him with mud. 

A fallen minister, if he is to rise again to power, must 
show that he is to be feared; this man, intoxicated by Roydl 
glibness, had fancied that his position would be permanent; 
he acknowledged his delinquencies; besides confessing them, 
he did Marcas a small money service, for Marcas had got 
into debt. He subsidized the newspaper on which Marcas 
worked, and made him the manager of it. 

Though he despised the man, Marcas, who, practically, 
was being subsidized too, consented to take the part of the 
fallen minister. Without unmasking at once all the batter- 
ies of his superior intellect, Marcas came a little further than 
before; he showed half his shrewdness. The Ministry lasted 
only a hundred and eighty days; it was swallowed up. 
Marcas had put himself into commimication with certain 
deputies, had moulded them like dough, leaving each im- 
pressed with a high opinion of his talent; his puppet again 
became a member of the Ministry, and then the paper was 
ministerial. The Ministry linited the paper with another, 
solely to squeeze out Marcas, who in this fusion had to make 
way for a rich and insolent rival, whose name was well 
known, and who already had his foot in the stirrup. 

Marcas relapsed into utter destitution; his haughty patron 
well knew the depths into which he had cast him. 

Where was he to go? The ministerial papers, privily 
warned, would have nothing to say to him. The oiqx>sition 
papers did not care to admit him to their ofiices. Marcas 
could side neither with the Republicans nor with the Legi- 
timists, two parties whose triiunph would mean the overtbiow 
of everything that now is. 



HONORS DE BALZAC in 

''Ambitious men like a fast hold on things/' said he with 
a smile. 

He lived by writing a few articles on commercial affairs, 
and contributed to one of those encyclopedias brou^t out 
by speculation and not by learning. Finally a paper was 
foimded, which was destined to live but two years, but which 
secured his services. From that montent he renewed his 
connection with the minister's enemies; he joined the party 
who were working for the fall of the Government; and as 
soon as his pickaxe had free play, it fell. 

This paper had now for six months ceased to exist; he 
had failed to find employment of any kind; he was spoken 
of as a dangerous man, calumny attacked him; he had un- 
masked a huge financial and mercantile job by a few articles 
and a pamphlet. He was known to be the mouthpiece of a 
banker who was said to have paid him largely, and from 
whom he was supposed to expect some patronage in return 
for his champion^ip. Marcas, disgusted by men and things, 
worn out by five years of fighting, regarded as a free lance 
rather than as a great leader, crushed by the necessity for 
eanring his daaly bread, which hindered him from gaining 
groimd, in despair at the influence exerted by money over 
mind, and given over to dire poverty, buried himself in a 
garret, to make thirty sous a day, the sum strictly answering 
to his needs. Meditation had leveled a desert all round 
him. He read the papers to be informed of what was going 
on. Pozzo di Borgo had once lived like this for some time. 

Marcas, no doubt, was planning a serious attack, accus- 
toming himself to dissimulation, and punishing himself for 
his blimders by Pythagorean muteness. But he did not tell 
us the reasons for his conduct. 

It is impossible to give you an idea of the scenes of the 
highest comedy that lay behind this algebraic statement of 
his career; his useless patience dogging the footsteps of for- 
tune, which presently took wings, his long tramps over the 
thorny brakes of Paris, his breathless chases as a petitioner, 
his attempts to win over fools; the schemes laid only to fail 
through the influence of some frivolous woman; the meetings 
with men of business who expected their capital to bring 



112 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

them places and a peerage, as well as large interest Then 
the hopes rising in a towering wave only to break in foam 
on the shoal; the wonders wrought in reconciling adverse 
interests whidi, after working together for a week, fdl 
asunder; the annoyance, a thousand times repeated, of seeing 
a dunce decorated with the Legion of Honour, and preferred, 
though as ignorant as a shop-boy to a man of talent Then, 
what Marcas called the stratagems of stupidity — ^jrou strike 
a man, and he seems convinced, he nods his head — every- 
thing is settled; next day, this india-rubber ball, flattened 
for a moment, has recovered itself in the course of the ni^^t; 
it is as full of wind as ever; you must begin all over agun; 
and you go on till you understand that you are not deal- 
ing with a man, but with a lump of gum that loses shape 
in the sunshine. 

These thousand annoyances, this vast waste of human 
energy on barren spots, the difficulty of achieving any good, 
the incredible facility of doing mischief; two strong games 
played out, twice won, and then twice lost; the hatred of a 
statesman — a blockhead with a painted face and a wig, 
but in whom the world believed — all these things, great 
and small, had not crushed, but for the moment had da^ed, 
Marcas. In the da3rs when money had come into his hands, 
his fingers had not clutched it; he had allowed himself the 
exquisite pleasure of sending it all to his family — to his sis- 
ters, his brothers, his old father. Like Napoleon in his fall, 
he asked for no more than thirty sous a day, and any man 
of energy can earn thirty sous for a day's work in Paris. 

When Marcas had finished the story of his life, inter- 
mingled with reflections, maxims, and observations, revealing 
him as a great politician, a few questions and answers on both 
sides as to the progress of affairs in France and in Europe 
were enough to prove to us that he was a real statesman; 
for a man may be quickly and easily judged when he can 
be brought on to the ground of immediate difficulties: there 
is a certain Shibboleth for men of superior talents, and we 
were of the tribe of modem Levites without belon^ng as 
yet to the Temple. As I have said, our frivolity oovered 



HONOR& DE BALZAC 113 

certain purposes which Juste has carried out, and which 1 
am about to execute. 

When we had done talking, we all three went out, cold as 
it was, to walk in the Luxembourg gardens till the dinner 
hour. In the course of that walk our conversation, grave 
throughout, turned on the painful aspects of the political 
situation. Each of us contributed his remarks, his com- 
ment, or his jest, a pleasantry or a proverb. This was no 
longer exclusively a discussion of life on the colossal scale 
just described by Marcas, the soldier of political warfare. 
Nor was it the distressful monologue of the wrecked navi- 
gator, stranded in a garret in the Hotel Comeille; it was a 
dialogue in which two well-informed young men, having 
gauged the times they lived in, were endeavouring, under the 
guidance of a man of talent, to gain some light on their own 
future prospects. 

"Why," asked Juste, "did you not wait patiently for an 
opportunity, and imitate the only man who has been able 
to keep the lead since the Revolution of July by holding 
his head above water?" 

"Have I not said that we never know where the roots of 
chance lie? Carrel was in identically the same position as 
the orator you speak of. That gloomy young man, of a 
bitter spirit, had a whole government in his head; the man 
of whom you speak had no idea beyond mounting on the 
crupper of every event. Of the two. Carrel was the better 
man. Well, one became a minister. Carrel remained a 
journalist; the incomplete but craftier man is living; Carrel 
is dead. 

"I may point out that your man has for fifteen years been 
making his way, and is but making it still. He may yet be 
caught and cnushed between two cars full of intrigues on 
the highroad to power. He has no house; he has not the 
favour of the palace like Mettemich; nor, like Villde, the 
protection of a compact majority. 

"I do not believe that the present state of things will last 
ten years longer. Hence, supposing I should have such poor 
good ludL, I am already too late to avoid being swept away 



114 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

by the commotion I foresee. I should need to be established 
in a superior position." 

"What commotion?" asked Juste. 

"August, 1830," said Marcas in solemn tones, holding out 
his hand towards Paris; "August, the offering of Youth 
which bound the sheaves, and of Intellect which had ripened 
the harvest, forgot to provide for Youth and Intellect 

"Youth will explode like the boiler of a steam-engine. 
Youth has no outlet in France; it is ga&ering an avalanche 
of underrated capabilities, of legitimate and restless ambi- 
tions; young men are not marrying now; families cannot tdl 
what to do with their children. What will the thunderclap 
be that will shake down these masses? I know not, but 
they will crash down into the midst of things, and over^irow 
everything. These are laws of hydrostatics which act on 
the human race; the Roman Empire had failed to under- 
stand them, and the Barbaric hordes came down. 

"The Barbaric hordes now are the intelligent class. The 
laws of overpressure are at this moment acting slowly and 
silently in our midst. The Government is the great criminal; 
it does not appreciate the two powers to which it owes 
everything; it has allowed its hands to be tied by the absurd- 
ities of the Contract; it is bound, ready to be the victim. 

"Louis XIV., Napoleon, England, all were or are eager 
for intelligent youth. In France the young are condemned 
by the new legislation, by the blundering principles of elec- 
tive rights, by the unsoundness of the ministerial constitu- 
tion. 

"Look at the elective Chamber; you will find no dq>uties 
of thirty; the youth of Richelieu and of Mazarin, of Turenne 
and of Colbert, of Pitt and of Saint- Just, of Ns^leon and 
of Prince Mettemich, would find no admission there; Buike, 
Sheridan, or Fox could not win seats. Even if political 
majority had been fixed at one-and-twenty, and eligibility 
had been relieved of every disabling qualification, the De- 
partments would have returned the very same members, men 
devoid of political talent, unable to speak without nmrdering 
French grammar, p^d among whom, in ten years, scarody 
one statesman has been foimd. 



HONORS DE BALZAC 115 

"The causes of an impending event may be seen, but the 
event itself cannot be foretold. At this moment the youth 
of France is being driven into Republicanism, because it be- 
lieves that the Republic would bring it emancipation. It 
will always remember the yoimg representatives of the 
people and the young army leaders I The imprudence of the 
Government is only comparable to its avarice." 

That day left its echoes in our lives. Marcas confirmed 
us in our resolution to leave France, where yoimg men of 
talent and energy are crushed under flie weight of successful 
commonplace, envious, and insatiable middle- age. 

We dined together in the Rue de da Harpe. We thence- 
forth felt for Marcas the most respectful affection; he gave 
us the most practical aid in the sphere of the mind. That 
man knew everything; he had studied everything. For us 
he cast his eye over the whole civilized world, seeking the 
coimtry where openings would be at once the most abundant 
and the most favourable to the success of our plans. He in- 
dicated what should be the goal of our studies; he bid us 
make haste, explaining to us that time was precious, that 
emigration would presently begin, and that its effect would 
be to deprive France of the cream of its powers and of its 
youthful talent; that their intelligence, necessarily sharpened^ 
would select the best places, and that the great thing was to 
be first in the field. 

Thencefon^^ard, we often sat late at work under the lamp. 
Our generous instructor wrote some notes for our guidance — 
two pages for Juste and three for me — full of invaluable 
advice — the sort of information which experience alone can 
supply, such landmarks as only genius can place. In those 
papers, smelling of tobacco, and covered with writing so vile 
as to be almost hieroglyphic, there are suggestions for a 
fortune, and forecasts of unerring acumen. There are hints 
as to certain parts of America and Asia which have been 
fully justified, both before and smce Juste and I could set 
out. 

MarcaS; like us, was in the most abject poverty. He 
earned, indeed, his iiaily bread, but he had neither linen, 
clothes, nor shoes. He did not make himself out any better 



ii6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

than he was; his dreams had been of luxuiy as wdl as of 
power. He did not admit that this was the real Marcas; 
he abandoned his person, indeed, to the caprices of life. 
What he lived by was the breath of ambition; he dreamed 
of revenge while blaming himself for yielding to so shallow 
a feeling. The true statesman ought, above all things, to be 
be superior to vulgar passions; like the man of science, he 
should have no passion but for his science. It was in these 
days of dire necessity that Marcas seemed to us so great — 
nay, so terrible; there was something awful in the gaze 
which saw another world than that which strikes the eye of 
ordinary men. To us he was a subject of contemplation 
and astonishment; for the yoimg — ^which of us has not 
known it? — the young have a keen craving to admire; they 
love to attach themselves, and are naturally inclined to 
submit to the men they feel to be superior, as they are to 
devote themselves to a great cause. 

Our surprise was chiefly aroused by his indifference in mat- 
ters of sentiment; woman had no place in his life. When 
we spoke of this matter, a perennial theme of conversation 
among Frenchmen, he simply remarked: 

"Gowns cost too much." 

He saw the look that passed between Juste and me, and 
went on: 

"Yes, far too much. The woman you buy — and she is the 
least expensive — takes a great deal of money. The woman 
who gives herself takes all your time! Woman extinguishes 
every energy, every ambition. Napoleon reduced her to what 
she should be. From that point of view, he really was great. 
He did not indulge such ruinous fancies of Louis XIV. and 
Louis XV. ; at the same time, he could love in secret." 

We discovered that, like Pitt, who made England his mft^ 
Marcas bore France in his heart; he idolized his cotmtry; he 
had not a thought that was not for his native land. IBs fury 
at feeling that he had in his hands the remedy for the evils 
which so deeply saddened him, and could not apolv it, ate 
into his soul, and this rage was increased bv the inferiority of 
France at that time, as compared with Russia and En^and. 
France a third-rate power 1 This cry came vp again and 



HONORS DE BALZAC 117 

again in his conversation. The intestinal disorders of his 
country had entered into his soul. All the contests between 
the Court and the Chamber, showing, as they did, incessant 
change and constant vacillation, which must injure the pros- 
perity of the country, he scoffed at as backstairs squabbles. 
"This is peace at the cost of the future," said he. 

One evening Juste and I were at work, sitting in perfed 
silence. Marcas had just risen to toil at his copying, for he 
had refused our assistance in spite of our most earnest en- 
treaties. We had offered to take it in turns to copy a batch 
of manuscript, so that he should do but a third of his dis- 
tasteful task; he had been quite angry, and we had ceased 
to insist. 

We heard the sound of gentlemanly boots in the pas- 
sage, and raised our heads, looking at each other. There was 
a tap at Marcas' door — ^he never took the key out of the 
lock — and we heard the hero answer: 

"Come in." Then — "What! you here, monsieur?" 

"I myself," replied the retired minister. 

It was the Diocletian of this unknown martyr. 

For some time he and our neighbour conversed in an under- 
tone. Suddenly Marcas, whose voice had been heard but 
rarely, as is natural in a dialogue in which the applicant be- 
gins by setting forth the situation, broke out loudly in reply 
to some offer we had not overheard. 

"You would laugh at me for a fool," cried he, "if I took 
you at your word. Jesuits are a thing of the past, but Je- 
suitism is eternal. Your Machiavelism and your generosity 
are equally hollow and untrustworthy. You can make your 
own calculations, but who can calculate on you? Your 
Court is made up of owls who fear the light, of«old men who 
quake in the presence of the young, or who simply disregard 
them. The Government is formed on the same pattern as 
the Court. You have hunted up the remains of the Empire, 
as the Restoration enlisted the Voltigeurs of Louis XIV. 

"Hitherto the evasions of cowardice have been taken lot 
the manoeuvring of ability; but dangers will come, and the 
younger generation will rise as they did in 1 790. They did 



ii8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

grand things then. — Just now you change ministries as a 
sick man turns in his bed; these oscillations betray the weak- 
ness of the Government. You work on an imderhand sjrstem 
of policy which will be turned against you, for France will 
be tired of your shufflmg. France will not tell you that she 
is tired of you; a man never knows whence his ruin comes; 
it is the historian's task to find out; but you will undoubtedly 
perish as the reward of not having the youth of France to 
lend you its strength and energy; for having hated really 
capable men; for not having lovingly chosen them from thfe 
noble generation; for having in all cases preferred mediocrity. 

"You have come to ask my support, but you are an atom 
in that decrepit heap which is made hideous by self-interest, 
which trembles and squirms, and, because it is so mean, tries 
to make France mean too. My strong nature, my ideas, 
would work like poison in you; twice you have tricked me, 
twice have I overthrown you. If we imite a third time, it 
must be a very serious matter. I should kill myself if I 
allowed myself to be duped; for I should be to blame, not 
you." 

Then we heard the humblest entreaties, the most fervent 
adjurations, not to deprive the country of such superior 
talents. The man spoke of patriotism, and Marcas uttered 
a significant "Ouh! ouh!" He lauded at his would-be 
patron. Then the statesman was more explicit; he bowed to 
the superiority of his erstwhile counselor; he pledged himself 
to enable Marcas to remain in office, to be elected deputy; 
then he offered him a high appointment, promising him fhaX 
he, the speaker, would tiienceforth be the subordinate of a 
man whose subaltern he was only worthy to be. He was in 
the newly-formed ministry, and he would not return to power 
unless Marcas had a post in proportion to his merit; he had 
already made it a condition, Marcas had been regarded as 
indispensable. 

Marcas refused. 

"I have never before been in a position to keep my prom- 
ises; here is an oppx)rtunity of proving m}^f faithfid to my 
word, and you faO me." 



HONORS DE BALZAC 119 

To this Marcas made no reply. The boots were again 
audible in the passage on the way to the stairs. 

"MarcasI Marcas!" we both cried, rushing into his room. 
"Why refuse? He really meant it. His offers are very 
handsome; at any rate, go to see the ministers." 

In a twinkling, we had given Marcas a hundred reasons. 
The minister's voice was sincere; without seeing him, we had 
felt sure that he was honest. 

"I have no clothes," replied Marcas. 

"Rely on us," said Juste, with a glance at me. 

Marcus had the courage to trust us; a light flashed in his 
eye, he pushed his fingers through his hair, lifting it from 
his forehead with a gesture that showed some confidence in 
his luck; and when he had thus unveiled his face, so to 
speak, we saw in him a man absolutely unknown to us — 
Marcas sublime, Marcas in his power! His mind in its 
element — the bird restored to the free air, the fish to the 
water, the horse galloping across the plain. 

It was transient. His brow clouded again; he had, it 
would seem, a vision of his fate. Halting doubt had fol- 
lowed close on the heels of white-winged hope. 

We left him to himself. 

"Now, then," said I to the Doctor, "we have given our 
word; how are we to keep it?" 

"We will sleep upon it," said Juste, "and to-morrow morn- 
ing we will talk it over." 

We had had time to think over the incidents of the past 
night, and were both equally surprised at the lack of ad- 
dress shown by Marcas in the minor difficulties of life — ^he, 
a man who never saw any difficulties in the solution of the 
hardest problems of abstract or practical politics. But these 
elevated characters can all be tripped upon a grain of sand, 
and will, like the grandest enterprise, miss fire for want of 
a thousand francs. It is the old story of Napoleon, who, 
for lack of a pair of boots, did not set out for India. 

"Well, what have you hit upon?" asked Juste. 

"I have thought of a way to get him a complete outfit" 
• "Where?" 

"From Humann." 



120 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"How?" 

"Humann, my boy, never goes to his costmners— his cus- 
tomers go to him; so that he does not know whether I ^m 
rich or poor. He only knows that I dress wdl and look 
decent in the clothes he makes for me. I shall tdl him that 
an un Je of mine has droi^)ed in from the country, and that 
his xdifference in matters of dress is quite a discredit to me 
in the upper circles where I am trying to find a wife. — ^It will 
not be Humann if he sends in his bfll before thrSe months." 

The Doctor thought this a capital idea for a vaudeville, 
but poor enough in real life, and doubted my success. But 
I give you my word of honour, Humann dressed Marcas, and, 
being an artist, turned him out as a political personage oug^t 
to be dressed. 

Juste lent Marcas two hundr^ francs in gold, the product 
of two watches bought on credit, and pawned at the Mont- 
de Pi6t^. For my part, I had said nothing of six shirts and 
all necessary linen, which cost me no more than the pleasure 
asking for them from a forewoman in a shop whom I had 
treated to Musard^s during the carnival. 

Marcas accepted everything, thanking us no more than he 
ought. He only inquired as to the means by which we had 
got possession of sudi riches, and we made him lau^ for the 
last time. We looked on our Marcas as shipowners, when 
they have exhausted their credit and evory resource at their 
command to fit out a vessel, must look on it as it puts to sea. 

Here Charles was silent; he seemed crushed by his mem- 
ories. 

"Well," cried the audience, "and what hai^)ened?" 

"I will tell you in a few words — for this is not romance — 
it is history." 

We saw no more of Marcas. The administration lasted 
for three months; it fell at the end of the session. Then 
Marcas came back to us, worked to death. He had souncted 
the crater of power; he came away from it with the b^in- 
nings of brain fever. The disease made r^id progress; we 
nuiied him. Juste at once called in the chief fdiyadan of 
the hospital where he was woiking as house-surgeon. I was 
then living alone m our room, and I was the most attentive 



HONOR& DE BALZAC 121 

attendant; but care and science alike were in vsun. By 
the month of January, 1838, Marcas himself felt that he had 
but a few days to live. 

The man whose soul and brain he had been for six months 
never even sent to inquire after him. Marcas expressed the 
greatest contempt for the Government; he seemed to doubt 
what the fate of France might be, and it was this doubt that 
had made him ill. He had, he thought, detected treason 
in the heart of power, not tangible, seizable treason, the 
result of facts, but the treason of a system, the subordina- 
tion of national interests to selfish ends. His belief in the 
degradation of the coimtry was enough to aggravate his 
complaint. 

I myself was witness to the proposals made to him by one 
of the leaders of the antagonistic party which he had fought 
against. His hatred of the men he had tried to serve was 
so virulent, that he would gladly have joined the coalition 
that was about to be formed among certain ambitious spirits 
who, at least, had one idea in common — that of shaking off 
the yoke of the Court. But Marcas could only reply to the 
envoy in the words of the Hotel de Ville: 

"It is too late!" 

Marcas did not leave money enough to pay for his funeral. 
Juste and I had great difficulty in saving him from the 
ignominy of a pauperis bier, and we alone followed the coffin 
of Z. Marcas, which was dropped into the common grave of 
the cemetery of Mont-Pamasse. 

We looked sadly at each other as we listened to this tale, 
the last we heard from the lips of Charles Rabourdin the 
day before he embarked at le Havre on a brig that was to 
•onvey him to the islands of Malay. We all knew more than 
one Marcas, more than one victim of his devotion to a 
party, repaid by betrayal or neglect 



THE VENUS OF ILLE 

(La Vhius (TlUe) 
By PROSPER M£RIM£E 

Kal I(iii0€» ofkoo^ dvftoefoc Av. 

AOYKIANOY •lAOVSTAHZ. 

I WAS descending the last slope of CanigoUy and, althoa^ 
the sun had already set, I could distinguish in the plaM 
below the houses of the little town of Die, for which I 
was bound. 

"You know/' I said to the Catalan who had been acting 
as my guide since the preceding day, "you know, doubt- 
less, where Monsieur de Peyrehorade lives?" 

"Do I know!" he cried; "why, I know his house as wdl 
as I do my own; and if it wasn't so dark, I'd show it to 
you. It's tibe finest house in lUe. He has money, you know, 
has Monsieur de Peyrehorade; and his son is going to many 
a girl that's richer than himself." 

"Is the marriage to take place soon?" I asked. 

"Soon! It may be that the fiddles are alreacfy ordered 
for the wedding. To-night, perhaps, or to-morrow, or the 
day after, for ^1 I know! It's to be at Puygarrig; for it's 
Mademoiselle de Puygarrig that the young gentleman is 
going to marry." 

I had a letter of introduction to M. de Peyrehorade from 
my friend M. de P. He was, so my friend had told me, a 
very learned antiquarian, and good-natured and obliging to 
the last degree. He woiild take pleasure in showing me aO 
the ruins within a radius of ten leagues. Now, I rdied upon 

Translated by George Burnhaxn Ives. Copyright, 1903, tqr 
G. P. Putnam's Sons. 

122 



PROSPER M&RIMM 123 

him to accompany me about the country near Hie, which I 
knew to be rich in monuments of ancient times and of the 
Middle Ages. This marriage, of which I now heard for the 
first time, might upset all my plans. 

"I shall be an interloper," I said to myself. 

But I was expected; as my arrival had been announced 
by M. de P., I must needs present myself. 

"Ill bet you, monsieur," said my guide, as we reached 
the foot of the mountain, "Fll bet you a cigar that I can 
guess what you are going to do at Monsieur de Peyreho- 
rade's." 

"Why, that is not very hard to guess," I replied, offering 
him a cigar. "At this time of day, when one has walked 
six leagues over Canigou, the most urgent business is sup- 
per." 

"Yes, but to-morrow? Look you, V\\ bet that you have 
come to Ille to see the idol! I guessed that when I saw you 
drawing pictures of the saints at Serrabona." 

"The idol! what idol?" The word had aroused my curi- 
osity. 

"What! didn't any one at Perpignan tell you how Mon- 
sieur de Peyrehorade had found an idol in the ground?" 

"You mean a terra-cotta, or clay statue, don't you?" 

"No, indeed! I mean a copper one, and it's big enough 
to make a lot of big sous. It weighs as much as a church 
bell. It was way down in the ground, at the foot of an 
olive tree, that we found it." 

"So you were present at the discovery, were you?" 

"Yes, monsieur. Monsieur de Peyrehorade told us a 
fortnight ago, Jean Coll and me, to dig up an old olive tree 
that got frozen last year — for it was a very hard winter, you 
know. So, while we were at work, Jean Coll, who was go- 
ing at it with all his might, dug his pick into the dirt, and 
I heard a bimm — just as if he'd struck a bell. — 'What's 
that?' says I. We kept on digging and digging, and first 
a black hand showed; it looked like a dead man's hand 
sticking out of the groimd. For my part, I was scared. I 
goes to monsieur, and I says to him: 'Dead men under the 
olive tree, master. You'd better call the cur6.' 



124 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

" 'What dead men?' he says. 

"He went with me, and he'd no sooner seen the hand 
than he sings out: 'An antique! an antique 1' You'd have 
thought he had found a treasure. And to work he went with 
the pick and with his hands, and did as much as both of 
us together, you might say." 

"Well, what did you find?" 

"A tall black woman more than half naked, saving your 
presence, monsieur, of solid copper; and Monsieur de Pey- 
rehorade told us that it was an idol of heathen times — of 
the time of Charlemagne!" 

"I see what it is: a bronze Blessed Virgin from some dis- 
mantled convent." 

"A Blessed Virgm! oh, yes! I should have recognised it 
if it had been a Blessed Virgin. It's an idol, I tell you; you 
can see that from its expression. It fastens its great white 
eyes on you; you'd think it was trying to stare you out of 
countenance. Why, you actually lower your eyes when you 
look at it." 

"White eyes? They are incrusted on the bronze, no 
doubt. It may be some Roman statue." 

"Roman! that's it. Monsieur de Peyrehorade says she's 
a Roman. — Ah! I see that you're a scholar like him." 

"Is it whole, well preserved?" 

"Oh! it's all there, monsieur. It's even handsomer and 
finished better than the plaster-of-Paris bust of Louis Philif^ 
at the mayor's office. But for all that, I can't get over the 
idol's face. It has a wicked look — and she is wicked, too." 

"Wicked! what harm has she done you?" 

"None to me exactly; but I'll tell you. We had got 
down on all fours to stand her up, and Monsieiu* de Pqnre- 
horade, he was pulling on the rope, too, althou^ he hasnt 
any more strength than a chicken, the excellent man! With 
a good deal of trouble we got her on her feet. I was pick- 
ing up a piece of stone to wedge her, when, patatrasf down 
she went a^in. all in a heap. 'Stand from underl' says I. 
But I was too late, for Jean Coll didn't have time to pall 
out his leg." 

"And he was hurt?" 



PROSPER M6.R1M&E 125 

"His poor leg broken off short like a stick! Picairef 
when I saw that, I was furious. I wanted to smash the idol 
with my pickaxe, but Monsieur de Peyrehorade held me 
back. He gave Jean Coll some money, but he*s been in bed 
all the same ever since it happened, a fortnight ago, and the 
doctor says he'll never walk with that leg like the other. 
It's a pity, for he was our best runner, and next to Mon- 
sieur's son, the best tennis player. I tell you, it made 
Monsieur Alphonse de Peyrehorade feel bad, for Coll always 
played with him. It was fine to see how they'd send the 
balls back at each other. Paf! paf! They never touched 
the groimd." 

Chatting thus we entered Ille, and I soon foimd myself 
in M. de Peyrehorade's presence. He was a little old man, 
stOl hale and active, with powdered hair, a red nose, and a 
jovial, bantering air. Before opening M. de P.'s letter, he 
installed himself in front of a bountifully spread table, and 
introduced me to his wife and son as an illustrious archaeolo- 
gist, who was destined to rescue Roussillon from the ob- 
livion in which the indifference of scholars had thus far 
left it. 

While eating with a hearty appetite — for nothing is more 
conducive thereto than the keen mountain air — I examined 
my hosts. I have already said a word or two of M. de Pey- 
rehorade; I must add that he was vivacity personified. He 
talked, ate, rose from his chair, ran to his library, brought 
books to me, showed me prints, filled my glass; he was never 
at rest for two minutes in succession. His wife, who was 
a trifle too stout, like all the Catalan women after they have 
passed forty, impressed me as a typical provincial, who had 
no interests outside her household. Although the supper was 
ample for at least six persons, she ran to the kitchen, or- 
dered pigeons killed, all sorts of things fried, and opened 
Heaven knows how many jars of preserves. In an instant 
the table was laden with dishes and bottles, and I should 
certainly have died of indigestion if I had even tasted every- 
thing that was offered me. And yet, with every new dish 
that I declined, there were renewed apologies. She was 
afraid that I would find myself very badly ofif at Ille. One 



126 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

had so few resources in the provinces, and Parisians woe so 
hard to please! 

Amid all the goings and comings of his parents, M. Al- 
phonse de Peyrehorade sat as motionless as the god Ter- 
minus. He was a tall yoimg man of twenty-six, with a 
handsome and regular face, which, however, lacked e]q>res- 
sion. His figure and his athletic proportions fully justified 
the reputation of an indefatigable tennis player which he 
enjoyed throughout the province. On this evening he was 
dressed in the height of fashion, exactly in accordance with 
the engraving in the last number of the Journal des Modes. 
But he seemed ill at ease in his clothes; he was as stiff as 
a picket in his velvet stock, and moved his whole body when 
he turned. His rough, sunburned hands and short nails 
formed a striking contrast to his costume. They were the 
hands of a ploughman emerging from the sleeves of a dandy* 
Furthermore, although he scrutinised me with interest from 
head to foot, I being a Parisian, he spoke to me but once 
during the evening, and that was to a^ me where I bou^t 
my watch chain. 

"Look you, my dear guest," said M. de Peyrehorade, as 
the supper drew to a dose, "you belong to me, you are in 
my house; I shall not let you go until you have seen every- 
thing of interest that we have in our moimtains. You must 
learn to know our Roussillon, and you must do her justice. 
You have no suspicion of all that we are going to show 
you: Phoenician, Celtic, Roman, Arabian, Byzantine monu- 
ments—you shall see them all, from the cedar to the hyssop. 
I will take you everywhere, and I will not let you off a sing^ 
brick." 

A paroxysm of coughing compelled him to pause. I 
seized the opportimity to say that I should be distressed 
to incommode him at a season so fraught with interest to 
his family. If he would simply give me the benefit of 
his excellent advice as to the excursions it would be wdl for 
me to make, I could easily, without putting him to the 
trouble of accompanying me 

'^Ah! you refer to this boy's marriage," he exdaimed, 
interrupting me. '^That's a mere trifle--it wOI take place 



PROSPER M&RIM&E lar 

day after to-morrow. You must attend the wedding with 
us, en famUle, as the bride is in mourning for an aunt whose 
property she inherits. So there are to be no festivities, no 
ball. It is too bad, for you might have seen our Catalan 
girls dance. They are very pretty, and perhaps you would 
have felt inclined to follow my i^phonse's example. One 
marriage, they say, leads to others. — Saturday, when the 
young people are married, I shall be free, and we will take 
the field. I ask your pardon for subjecting you to the ennui 
of a provincial wedding. For a Parisian, sated with parties 
of all sorts — and a wedding without a ball, at that! How- 
ever, you will see a bride — a bride — you must tell me what 
you think of her. But you are a serious man, and you 
don^t look at women any more. I have something better 
than that to show you. I will show you something worth 
seeing! I have a famous surprise in store for you to- 
morrow." 

"Mon Dieu!" said I, "it is difficult to keep a treasure 
in one's house without the public knowing all about it. 
I fancy that I can divine the surprise that you have in store 
for me. But if you refer to your statue, the description 
of it that my guide gave me has served simply to arouse 
my curiosity and to predispose me to admiration." 

"Ah! so he spoke to you about the idol — for that is what 
they call my beautiful Venus Tur — but I will tell you noth- 
ing now. You shall see her to-morrow, by daylight, and 
tell me whether I am justified in considering her a chef- 
d'oevre. Parbleu! you could not have arrived more oppor- 
tunely! There are some inscriptions which I, poor ignora- 
mus that I am, interpret after my manner. But a scholar 
from Paris! It may be that you will make fun of my inter- 
pretation — for I have written a memoir — I, who speak to 
you, an old provincial antiquary, have made a start; I pro- 
pose to make the printing-presses groan. If you would 
kindly read and correct me, I might hope. For example, I 
am very curious to know how you will translate this in- 
scription on the pedestal: cave — ^but I won't ask you any- 
thing yet. Until to-morrow! imtil to-morrow! Not a word 
about the Venus to-day!" 



128 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"You are quite right, Peyrehorade/* said his wife, "to 
let your old idol rest. You must see that you are keeping 
monsieur from eating. Bah I monsieur has seen much finer 
statues than yoiurs in Paris. There are dozens of them at 
the Tuileries, and bronze ones, too." 

"There you have the ignorance, the blessed ignorance of 
the provinces!" interrupted M. de Pe)n"ehorade. "Think of 
comparing an admirable antique to Coustou's inapid figures I 

"With what irreverence 
Doth my good wife speak of the godsT 

Would you believe that my wife wanted me to mdt my statue 
and make it into a bell for our church! She would have 
been the donor, you see. A chef-d'csuvre of M)n'on, mon- 
sieur!" 

'^Chef-d'oeuvre! chej-d'oeuvre! a pretty ckef-d^ceuvre she 
made! to break a man*s leg!" 

"Look you, my wife," said M. de Peyrehorade in a de- 
termined tone, extending his right leg encased in a stocking 
of Chinese silk, in her direction, "if my Venus had broken 
this leg, I should not regret it." 

"Gracious Heaven! how can you say that, Pe3n:ehorade? 
Luckily the man is getting better. Still, I can't make up 
my mind to look at the statue that causes such accidents 
as that. Poor Jean Coll!" 

"Wounded by Venus, monsieur," said M. de Pe3n:ehoradey 
with a chuckle, "wounded by Venus, the down complains: 

•"Veneris nee praemia noris.' 

"Who has not been wounded by Venus?" 
M. Alphonse, who imderstood French better than Latin, 
winked with a knowing look, and glanced at me as if to 
ask: 

"And you, Monsieur le Parisien, do you understand?'' 
The supper came to an end. I had eaten nothing for the 
last hour. I was tired and I could not succeed in dissem- 
bling the frequent yawns which escaped me. Madame de 
Peyrehorade v^* t>ie fiiMt tr nntiV^ my plight and o bs er v e d 



PROSPER M&RIM6E 129 

that it \vas time to go to bed. Thereupon began a new 
series of apologies for the wretched accommodations I was 
to have. I should not be as comfortable as I was in Paris. 
One is so badly off in the provinces! I must be indulgent 
for the Roussillannais. In vam did I protest that after 
a journey in the mountains a sheaf of straw would be a 
luxurious bed for me — she continued to beg me to excuse 
unfortunate country folk if they did not treat me as well 
as they would have liked to do. I went upstairs at last to 
the room allotted to me, escorted by M. de Peyrehorade. 
The staircase, the upper stairs of whidi were of wood, ended 
in the centre of a corridor upon which several rooms opened. 

"At the right," said my host, "is the apartment which 
I intend to give to Madame Alphonse that is to be. Your 
room is at fiie end of the opposite corridor. You know,*' 
he added, with an expression meant to be sly, "you know 
we must put a newly married couple all by themselves. 
You are at one end of the hoxise and they at the other." 

We entered a handsomely furnished room, in which the 
first object that caught my eye was a bed seven feet long, 
six feet wide, and so high that one had to use a stool to 
climb to the top. My host, having pointed out the loca- 
tion of the bell, having assured himself that the sugarbowl 
was full, and that the bottles of cologne had been duly 
placed on the dressing-table, and having asked me several 
times if I had everything that I wanted, wished me a good- 
night and left me alone. 

The windows were closed. Before imdressing I opened 
one of them to breathe the fresh night air, always delicious 
after a long supper. In front of me was Canigou, beautiful 
to look at always, but that evening, it seemed to me the 
most beautiful mountain in the world, lighted as it was by 
a brilliant moon. I stood for some minutes gazing at its 
wonderful silhouette, and was on the point of closing my 
window when, as I lowered my eyes, I saw the statue on a 
pedestal some forty yards from the hoxise. It was placed 
at the comer of a quickset hedge which separated a small 
garden from a large square of perfectly smooth turf, which, 
as I learned later, was the tennis-court of the town. This 



130 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

tract, which belonged to M. de Peyrehorade, had been ceded 
by him to the commune, at his son's urgent soiidtation. 

I was so far from the statue that I could not distinguish 
its attitude and could only guess at its height, whidi 
seemed to be about six feet. At that moment two young 
scamps from the town walked across the tennis-court, quite 
near the hedge, whistling the pretty Roussillon air, Man- 
tagnes Rigalades, They stopped to look at the statue, and 
one of them apostrophised it in a loud voice. He ^poke 
Catalan; but I had been long enough in Roussillon to un- 
derstand pretty nearly what he said. 

"So there you are, hussy! (The Catalan term was much 
more forcible.) So there you are!" he said. "So it was 
you who broke Jean Coil's leg! If you belonged to me, 
I'd break your neck! " 

"Bah! with what?" said the other. "She's made of cop- 
per, and it's so hard that Etienne broke his file, trying to 
file it. It's copper of the heaten times, and it's hairder 
than I don't know what." 

"If I had my cold-chisel" — ^it seemed that he was a lodt- 
smith's apprentice — "I'd soon dig out her big white eyes, 
as easy as I'd take an almond out of its Aell. They'd 
make more than a himdred sous in silver." 

They walked away a few steps. 

"I must bid the idol good-night," said the taller of the 
two, suddenly stopping again. 

He stooped, and, I suppose, picked up a stone. I saw 
him raise his arm and throw something, and mstantly there 
was a ringing blow on the bronze. At the same moment 
the apprentice put his hand to his head, with a sharp cry 
of pain. 

"She threw it back at me!" he exclaimed. 

And my two rascals fled at the top of their speed. It 
was evident that the stone had rebounded from the metal, 
and had punished the fellow for his affront to the goddess. 

I closed my window, laughing heartily. 

"Still another vandal chastised by Venus!" I thought. 
"May all the destroyers of our ancient monuments have 
their heads broken thus!" 



PROSPER M&RIM6E 131 

And with that charitable prayer, I fell asleep. 

It was broad daylight when I woke. Beside my bed were, 
on one side, M. de Peyrehorade in his robe'de-chambre; 
on the other a servant, sent by his wife, with a cup of 
chocolate in his hand. 

"Come, up with you, Parisian! This is just like you 
sluggards from the capital!" said my host, while I hastily 
dressed myself. "It is eight o'clock, and you are still in 
bed. I have been up since six. This is the third time I 
have come upstairs; I came to your door on tiptoe; not a 
sound, not a sign of life. It will injure you to sleep too 
much at your age. And you haven't seen my Venus yet! 
Come, drink this cup of Barcelona chocolate quickly. Gen- 
uine contraband, such chocolate as you don't get in Paris. 
You must lay up some strength, for, when you once stand 
in front of my Venus, I shall not be able to tear you away 
from her." 

In five minutes I was ready — that is to say, half shaved, 
my clothes half buttoned, and my throat scalded by the 
chocolate, which I had swallowed boiling hot. I went down 
into the garden and found myself before a really beautiful 
statue. 

It was, in truth, a Venus, and wonderfully lovely. The 
upper part of the body was nude, as the ancients ordinarily 
represented the great divinities; the right hand, raised as 
high as the breast, was turned with the palm inward, the 
thumb and first two fingers extended, the other two slightly 
bent. The other hand was near the hip and held the 
drapery that covered the lower part of the body. The pose 
of the statue recalled that of the Morra Player, usually 
known, I know not why, by the name of Germanicus. 
Perhaps the sculptor intended to represent the goddess play- 
ing the game of morra. 

However that may be, it is impossible to imagine anything 
more perfect than the body of that Venus; anything more 
harmonious, more voluptuous than her outlines, anything 
more graceful and more dignified than her drapery. I ex- 
pected to see some work of the later Empire; I saw a chej- 
d'oeuvre of the best period of statuary. What especially 



132 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

struck me was the exquisite verisimilitude of the forms^ 
which one might have believed to have been moulded bom 
nature, if nature ever produced such flawless models. 

The hair, which was brushed back from the forehead, 
seemed to have been gilded formerly. The head, which 
was small, like those of almost all Greek statues, was bent 
slightly forward. As for the face, I shall never succeed in 
describing its peculiar character; it was of a type which 
in no wise resembled that of any antique statue that I 
can remember. It was not the tranquil, severe beauty of the 
Greek sculptors, who systematically imparted a majestic 
immobility to all the features. Here, on the contrary, I 
observed with surprise a clearly marked intention on the 
part of the artist to express mischievousness amounting 
almost to deviltry. All the features were sli^tly con- 
tracted; the eyes were a little oblique, the comers of the 
mouth raised, the nostrils a little dilated. Disdam, irony, 
cruelty could be read upon that face, which none the tes 
was inconceivably lovely. In truth, the more one looked 
at that marvelous statue, the more distressed one felt at the 
thought that such wonderful beauty could be conjoined to 
utter absence of sensibility. 

"If the model ever existed," I said to Mr. Peyrehorade, — 
"and I doubt whether Heaven ever produced such a woman 
— ^how I pity her lovers! She must have delisted in 
driving them to death from despair. There is something 
downright savage in her expression, and yet I never have 
seen anything so beautiful!" 

" Tis Venus all intent upon her prey!" quoted M. dc 
Peyrehorade, delighted with my enthusiasm. 

That expression of infernal irony was heigjhtened perhaps 
by the contrast between the very brilliant silver eyes and 
the coating of blackish green with which time had overlaid 
the whole statue. Those gleaming eyes created a certain 
illusion which suggested reality, life. I remembered what 
my guide had said, that she made those who looked at 
her lower their eyes. That was almost true, and I could 
not help feeling angry with myself as I realised that I 
was perceptibly ill at ease before that bronze figure. 



PROSPER M&RIMM 133 

''Now that you have admired her in every detail, my dear 
colleague in antiquarian research/' said my host, ^^let us 
open a scientific conference, if you please. What do you 
say to this inscription, which you have not noticed as yet?" 

He pointed to the base of the statue, and I read there 
these words: 

CAVE AMANTEM 

"Quid diets, doctissime?" ("What do you say, most 
learned of men?'') he asked, rubbing his hands. "Let us 
see if we shall agree as to the meaning of this cave amantem." 

"Why there are two possible meanings," I said. "It may 
be translated: * Beware of him who loves you — distrust 
lovers.' But I am not sure that cave amantem would be 
good Latin in that sense. In view of the lady's diabolical 
expression, I should be inclined to believe rafiier that the 
artist meant to put the spectator on his guard against that 
terrible beauty. So that I should translate: *Look out for 
yourself if she loves you.' " 

"Humph!" ejaculated M. de Pe3rrehorade; "yes, that is 
a possible translation; but, with all respect, I prefer the 
first, which I will develop a little, however. You know 
who Venus's lover was?" 

"She had several." 

"Yes, but the first one was Vulcan. Did not the artist 
mean to say: 'Despite all your beauty, and your scornful 
air, you shall have a blacksmith, a wretched cripple, for a 
lover'? A solemn lesson for coquettes, monsieur!" 

I could not help smiling, the interpretation seemed to 
me so exceedingly far-fetched. 

"The Latin is a terrible language, with its extraordinary 
conciseness," I observed, to avoid contradicting my anti- 
quary directly; and I stepped back a few steps, to obtain 
a better view of the statue. 

"One moment, colleague!" said M. de Pe3rrehorade, sdz- 
ing my arm, "you have not seen all. There is still another 
inscription. Stand on the pedestal and look at the right 



arm." 



As he ^x)ke, he helped me to dimb up. 



134 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

I clung somewhat unceremoniously to the neck of the 
Venus, with whom I was beginning to feel on intimate terms. 
I even looked her in the eye for an instant^ and I found 
her still more diabolical and still lovelier at dose quarters. 
Then I saw that there were some letters, in what I tocA 
to be the antique cursive hand, engraved on the ri^t arm. 
With the aid of a strong glass I ^)elled out what follows, 
M. de Peyrehorade repeating each word as I pronounced 
it, and expressing his approbation with voice and gesture. 
I read: 

VENERI TVRBVL — 
EVTYCHES MYRO 
IMPERIO FEaX 

After the word tvrbvl in the first line several letters 
seemed to have become effaced, but tvrbvl was porfectly 
legible. 

"Which means?" — queried my host, with a beaming face, 
and winking maliciously, for he had a shrewd idea that 
I would not easily handle that tvrbvl. 

"There is one word here which I do not understand as 
yet," I said; "all the rest is simple. 'Eutyches made this 
offering to Venus by her order.' " 

"Excellent. But what do you make of tvrbvl? What 
is tvrbvir 

**Tvrhvl puzzles me a good deal. I have tried in vain to 
think of some known epithet of Venus to assist me. What 
would you say to Turbulenta? Venus, who disturbs, who 
excites — as you see, I am still engrossed by her evil ex- 
pression. Turbulenta is not a very inapt epithet for Venus," 
I added modestly, for I was not very well satisfied myself 
with my explanation. 

"Turbulent Venus! Venus the roisterer! Ml so you 
think that my Venus is a wine-shop Venus, do you? Not 
by any means, monsieur; she is a Venus in good society. 
But I will explain this tvrbvl to you. Of course you wfll 
promise not to divulge my discovery before my memoir 
is printed. You see, I am very proud of this find of mine. 
You must leave us poor devils in the provinces a few 



PROSPER M&RIMM 135 

q>ears to glean. You are so rich, you Parisian scholars!" 

From the top of the pedestal, whereon I was still perched, 
I solemnly promised him that I would never be guilty of 
the baseness of stealing his discovery. 

"Tvrbvl — monsieur," he said, coming nearer to me and 
lowering his voice, for fear that some other than myself 
might hear — "read tvrbvlnerce." 

"I don't imderstand any better." 

"Listen. About a league from here, at the foot of the 
mountain, is a village called Boultemere. That name is a 
corruption of the Latin word Turbulnera, Nothing is more 
common than such inversions. Boultemfere, monsieur, was 
a Roman city. I have always suspected as much, but I 
have never had a proof of it. Here is the proof. This 
Venus was the local divinity of the city of Boultemere; 
and this word Boultemere, whose antique origin I have just 
demonstrated, proves something even more interesting — 
namely, that Boultemere, before it became a Roman city, 
was a Phoenician city!" 

He paused a moment to take breath and to enjoy my 
siuprise. I succeeded in restraining a very strong inclina- 
tion to laugh. 

"It is a fact," he continued, "Tutbulnera is pure Phoe- 
nician; Tur, pronounced Tour — Tour and Sour are the same 
word, are they not? Sour is the Phoenician name of Tyre; 
I do not need to remind you of its meaning. Bui is Baal; 
Bal, Bel, Bur — slight differences in pronunciation. As for 
nera — that gives me a little trouble. I am inclined to be- 
lieve, failing to find a Phoenican word, that it comes from 
the Greek word vtjqo^, damp, swampy. In that case the 
word would be a hybrid. To justify my suggestion of 
VT|^g,I will show you that at Boultemere the streams from 
the mountain form miasmatic pools. On the other hand, 
the termination nera may have been added much later, in 
honour of Nera Pivesuvia, wife of Tetricus, who may have 
had some property in the city of Turbul. But on accoxmt 
of the pools I prefer the etymology from vT)Q6g." 

And he took a pinch of snuff with a self-satisfied air. 

"But let us leave the Phoenicians and return to the in- 



136 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

scription. I translate then: To Venus of Boultem&rey My- 
ron, at her command, dedicates this statue,, his VTork.' " 

I had no idea of criticising his etymology, but I did 
desire to exhibit some little penetration on my own part; 
so I said to him: 

"Stop there a moment, monsieur. Myron dedicated 
something, but I see nothing to indicate that it was this 
statue." 

"What!" he cried, "was not Myron a famous Greek sculp- 
tor? The talent probably was handed down in the family; 
it was one of his descendants who executed this statue. 
Nothing can be more certain." 

"But," I rejoined, "I see a little hole in the arm. I be- 
lieve that it was made to fasten something to — a bracdet, 
perhaps, which this Myron presented to Venus as an ex- 
piatory offering. — M3rron was an imsuccessful lover; Venus 
was irritated with him and he appeased her by consecrating 
a gold bracelet to her. Observe that fedt is very often used 
in the sense of consecravit ; they are S3monymous terms. I 
could show you more than one example of what I say if 
I had Gruter or Orellius at hand. It would be quite natural 
for a lover to see Venus in a dream and to fancy, that she 
ordered him to give a gold bracelet to her statue. So 
Myron consecrated a bracelet to her; then the barbarians, 
or some sacrilegious thief " 

"Ah! it is easy to see that you have written novdr'" 
cried my host, giving me his hand to help me descend. 
"No, monsieur, it is a work of the school of Myron. Look 
at the workmanship simply and you will agree." 

Having made it a rule never to contradict outright an 
obstinate antiquarian, I himg my head with the air of one 
fully persuaded, saying: 

"It's an admirable thing." 

"Ah! men Dieu!" cried M. de Peyrehorade; "still an- 
other piece of vandalism! Somebody must have thrown a 
stone at my statue!" 

He had just discovered a white mark a little above 
Venus's breast. I observed a similar mark across the fin- 
gers of the right hand, which I then supposed had 



PROSPER M6RIM£E 137 

grazed by the stone;, or else that a fragment of the stone 
had been broken off by the blow and had bounded against 
the hand. I told my host about the msult that I had 
witnessed, and the speedy retribution that had followed. 
He laughed heartily, and, comparing the apprentice to 
Diomedes, expressed a hope that, like the Grecian hero, 
he might see all his companions transformed into birds. 

The breakfast bell interrupted this classical conversation, 
and I was again obliged, as on' the preceding day, to eat 
for four. Then M. de Peyrehorade^s farmers appeared; 
and while he gave audience to them, his son took me to 
see a caleche which he had bought at Toulouse for his 
fiancee, and which I admired, it is needless to say. Then 
I went with him into the stable, where he kept me half an 
hour, boasting of his horses, giving me their genealogies, and 
telling me of the prizes they had won at various races in 
the province. At last he reached the subject of his future 
wife, by a natural transition from a grey mare he intended 
for her. 

"We shall see her to-day," he said. "I do not know 
whether you will think her pretty; but everybody here and 
at Perpignan considers her charming. The best thing about 
her is that she's very rich. Her aunt at Prades left her 
all her property. Oh! I am going to be very happy." 

I was intensely disgusted to see a young man more 
touched by the dowry than by the beaux yeux of his be- 
trothed. 

"You know something about jewels," continued M. Al- 
phonse; "what do you think of this one? This is the ring 
that I am going to give her to-morrow." 

As he spoke, he took from the first joint of his little 
finger a huge ring with many diamonds, made m the shape 
of two clasped hands; an allusion which seemed to me ex- 
ceedingly poetical. The workmanship was very old, but 
I judged that it had been changed somewhat to allow the 
diamonds to be set. On the inside of the ring were these 
words in Gothic letters: Sempr' ab H; that is to say, "Al- 
ways with thee." 



1 38 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"It is a handsome ring," I said, ''but these diamonds 
have taken away something of its character." 

''Oh I it is much handsomer so," he replied, with a smile. 
"There are twelve himdred francs' worth of diamonds. My 
mother gave it to me. It was a very old family ring — of 
the times of chivalry. It belonged to my grandmothtf, 
who had it from hers. God knows when it was made." 

"The custom in Paris," I said, "tfeto give a very simple 
ring, usually made of two different metals, as gold and 
platinum, for instance. See, that other ring, which you 
wear on this finger, would be most suitable. This one, 
with its diamonds and its hands in relief, is so big that 
one could not wear a glove over it." 

"Oh! Madame Alphonse may arrange that as she pleases. 
I fancy that she will be very glad to have it all the same. 
Twelve hundred francs on one's finger is very pleasant 
This little ring," he added, glancing fatuously at the plain 
one which he wore, "was given me by a ¥7oman in Paris 
one Mardi Gras. Ah! how I did go it when I was in 
Paris two years ago! That's the place where one enjoys 
one's self!" 

And he heaved a sigh of regret. 

We were to dine that day at Puygarrig with the bride's 
parents; we drove in the caleche to the ch&teau, about a 
league and a half from Die. I was presented and made 
welcome as a friend of the family. I will say noth- 
ing of the dinner or of the conversation which fo^ 
lowed it, and in which I took little part. <M. Alphonse, 
seated beside his fiancee, said a word in her ear every 
quarter of an hour. As for her, she hardly raised her eyes, 
and whenever her future husband addressed her she 
blushed modestly, but replied without embarrassment 

Mademoiselle de Puygarrig was eighteen years of age; 
her supple and delicate figure formed a striking contrast to 
the bony frame of her athletic hand. She was not only 
lovely, but fascinating. I admired the perfect naturalness 
of all her replies; and her good-humoured air, which however 
was not exempt from a slight tinge of misdiief, reminded 
me, in q>ite of myself, of my host's Venus. As I made fhb 



PROSPER MRRIMEE 135 

comparison mentally, I asked myself whether the superior- 
ity in the matter of beauty which I could not choose but 
accord to the statue, did not consist in large measure in 
her tigress-like expression; for energy, even in evil pas- 
sions, always arouses in us a certain surprise and a sort of 
involuntary admiration. 

"What a pity," I said to myself as we left Puygarrig, 
"that such an attractive person should be rich, and that 
her dowry should cause her to be sought in marriage by a 
man who is unworthy of her!" 

On the way back to Ille, finding some difficulty in talk- 
ing with Madame de Peyrehorade, whom, however, I thought 
it only courteous to address now and then, I exclaimed: 

"You are very strong-minded here in Roussillon! To 
think of having a wedding on a Friday, madame! We are 
more superstitious in Paris; no one would dare to take a 
wife on that day." 

"Mon Dieu! don't mention it," said she; "if it had de- 
pended on me, they certainly would have chosen another 
day. But Peyrehorade would have it so, and I had to 
give way to him. It distresses me, however. Suppose any- 
thing should happen? There must surely be some reason 
for file superstition, for why else should every one be afraid 
of Friday?" 

"Friday!" cried her husband; "Friday is Venus's day! 
A splendid day for a wedding! You see, my dear colleague. 
I think of nothing but my Venus. On my honour, it was 
on her account that I chose a Friday. To-morrow, if you 
are willing, before the wedding, we will offer a little sacri- 
fice to her; we will sacrifice two pigeons, if I can find any 
incense." 

"For shame, Peyrehorade!" his wife interposed, scan- 
(Jalised to the last degree. "Bum incense to an idol! That 
would be an abomination! What would people in the 
nei^ibourhood say about you?" 

"At least," said M. de Pe3rrehorade, "you will allow me 
to place a wreath of roses and lilies on her head: 



M 



'Manibus date lilia plenis.' 



140 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

The charter, you see, mondeur, is an empt) word; we have 
no freedom of worship!" 

The order of ceremonies for the following day was thus 
arranged: everybody was to be fully dressed and ready at 
precisely ten o'clock. After taking a cup of chocolate, we 
were to drive to Puygarrig. The civil ceremony would take 
place at the mayor's office of that village, and the religious 
ceremony in the chapel of the ch&teau. Then there would 
be a breakfast. After that, we were to pass the time as 
best we could until seven o'clock, when we were to return 
to nie, to M. de Peyrehorade's, where the two families were 
to sup together. The rest followed as a matter of course. Be- 
ing unable to dance, the plan was to eat as much as possible. 

At eight o'clock I was already seated in front of the 
Venus, pencil in hand, beginning for the twentieth time to 
draw the head of the statue, whose expression I was still 
absolutely unable to catch. M. de Pe3n'ehorade hovered 
about me, gave me advice, and repeated his Phoenician ety- 
mologies; then he arranged some Bengal roses on the pedes- 
tal of the statue, and in a tragi-comic tone addressed 
supplications to it for the welfare of the couple who were 
to live under his roof. About nine o'clock he returned to 
the house to dress, and at the same time M. Alphonse ap- 
peared, encased in a tightly fitting new coat, white gloves, 
patent-leather shoes, and carved buttons, with a rose in hb 
buttonhole. 

''Will you paint my wife's portrait?" he asked, leaning 
over my drawing; "she is pretty, too." 

At that moment a game of tennis began on the court I 
have mentioned, and it immediately attracted M. Alphonse's 
attention. And I myself, being rather tired, and hopeless 
of being able to reproduce that diabolical face, soon left 
my drawing to watch the players. Among them were 
several Spanish muleteers who had arrived in the town tfie 
night before. There were Aragonese and Navarrese, almost 
all wonderfully skillful at the game. So that the men of 
lUe, although encouraged by the presence and counsels of 
M. Alphonse, were i^xSedily beaten by these new champioiiai 
The native spectators were appalled. M. Alphonse glA^cfd 



PROSPER M&RIM&E 141 

at his watch. It was only half after nine. His mother's 
hair was not dressed. He no longer hesitated, but took 
ofif his coat, asked for a jacket, and challenged the Span- 
iards. I watched him, smiling at his eagerness, and a little 
surprised. 

"I must uphold the honour of the province," he said 
to me. 

At that moment I considered him really handsome. He 
was thoroughly in earnest. His costume, which engrossed 
him so completely a moment before, was of no consequence. 
A few minutes earlier he was afraid to turn his head for 
fear of disarranging his cravat. Now, he paid no heed 
to his carefully curled locks, or to his beautifully laimdered 
ruff. And his fiancee? — Faith, I believe that, if it had 
been necessary, he would have postponed the wedding. I 
saw him hastily put on a pair of sandals, turn back his 
sleeves, and widi an air of confidence take his place at the 
head of the beaten side, like Csesar rallying his legions at 
Dyrrhachium. I leaped over the hedge and found a con- 
venient place in the shade of a plum-tree, where I could 
see both camps. 

Contrary to general expectation, M. Alphonse missed the 
first ball; to be sure, it skimmed along the ground, driven 
with astoimding force by an Aragonese who seemed to be 
the leader of the Spaniards. 

He was a man of some forty years, thin and wiry, about 
six feet tall; and his olive skin was almost as dark as the 
bronze of the Venus. 

M. Alphonse dashed his racquet to the ground in a 
passion. 

"It was this infernal ring," he cried: "it caught my fin- 
ger and made me miss a sure ball!" 

He removed the diamond ring, not without difficulty, and 
I stepped forward to take it; but he anticipated me, ran 
to the Venus, slipped the ring on her third finger, and re- 
sumed his position at the head of his townsmen. 

He was pale, but calm and determined. Thereafter he 
did not make a single mistake, and the Spaniards were 
completely routed. The enthusiasm of the i^ctators was 



142 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

a fine spectacle; some shouted for joy again and again, and 
tossed their caps in the air; Others shook his hands and 
called him an honour to the province. If he had repelled 
an invasion, I doubt whether he would have received more 
enthusiastic and more sincere congratulations. The chagrin 
of the defeated party added still more to the splendour of 
his victory. 

"We will play again, my good fellow," he said to the 
Aragonese in a lofty tone; "but I will give you points." 

I should have been glad if M. Alphonse had been more 
modest, and I was almost distressed by his rival's humilia- 
tion. The Spanish giant felt the insult keenly. I saw 
him turn pale under his tanned skin. He glanced with a 
sullen expression at his racquet, and ground his teeth; then 
he muttered in a voice choked with rage: 

"Me lo pagardsT 

M. de Peyrehorade's appearance interrupted his son's 
triumph. My host, greatly surprised not to find him su- 
perintending the harnessing of the new caliche, was much 
more surprised when he saw him drenched mth perspiration, 
and with his racquet in his hand. M. Alphonse ran to the 
house, washed his f^re and hands, resumed his new coat and 
his patent-leather boots, and five minutes later we were 
driving rapidly toward Puygarrig. All the tennis players 
of the town and a great number of spectators followed us 
with joyous shouts. The stout horses that drew us could 
hardly keep in advance of those dauntless Catalans. 

We had reached Puygarrig, and the procession was about 
to start for the mayor's office, when M. Alphonse put his 
hand to his forehead and whispered to me: 

"What a fool T am! I have forgotten the rinRl It is 
on the Venus's finger, the devil take her! For Heaven's 
sake, don't tell my mother. Perhaps she will not notice 
anytiiing." 

"You might send some one to get it," I said. 

"No, no! my servant stayed at Hie, and I don't trust 
these peonle here. Twelve hundred francs' worth of diar 
monds! that might be too mudi of a temntaion for more 
than one of them. Besides, what would they all thiid: of 



PROSPER M£RIM£E 143 

my absent-mindedness? They would make too much fun' of 
me. They would call me the statue's husband. — However, 
I trust that no one will steal it. Luckily, all my knaves are 
afraid of the idol. They don't dare go within arm's length 
of it. — Bah! it's no matter; I have another ring." 

The two ceremonies, civil and religious, were performed 
with suitable pomp, and Mademoiselle de Puygarrig re- 
ceived a ring tiiat formerly belonged to a milliner's girl at 
Paris, with no suspicion that her husband was bestowing 
upon her a pledge of love. Then we betook ourselves to 
the table, where we ate and drank, yes, and sang, all at 
great length. I sympathised with the bride amid the vulgar 
merriment that burst forth all about her; however, she put 
a better face on it than I could have hoped, and her em- 
barrassment was neither awkwardness nor affectation. It 
may be that courage comes of itself with difficult situations. 

The breakfast came to an end when God willed; it was 
four o'clock; the men went out to walk in the park, which 
was magnificent, or watched the peasant girls of Puygarrig, 
dressed in their gala costumes, dance on the lawn in front 
of the chateau. In this way, we passed several hours. 
Meanwhile the women were hovering eagerly about the 
bride, who showed them her wedding gifts. Then she 
changed her dress, and I observed that she had covered her 
lovely hair with a cap and a hat adorned with feathers; 
for there is nothing that wives are in such a hurry to do 
as to assume as soon as possible those articles of apparel 
which custom forbids them to wear when they are still un- 
married. 

It was nearly eight o'clock when we prepared to start for 
Die. But before we started there was a pathetic scene. 
Mademoiselle de Puygarrig's aimt, who had taken the place 
of a mother to her, a woman of a very advanced age and 
very religious, was not to go to the town with us. At 
oiu: departure, she delivered a touching sermon to her niece 
on her duties as a wife, the result of which was a torrent 
of tears, and embraces without end. M. de Peyrehorade 
compared this separation to the abduction of the Sabine 
women. 



144 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

We started at last, however, and on the road we all 
exerted ourselves to the utmost to divert the bride and 
make her laugh; but it was all to no purpose. 

At Ille supper awaited us, and such a supper! If the 
vulgar hilarity of the morning had disgusted me, I was fairly 
sickened by the equivocal remarks and jests which were 
aimed at the groom, and especially at the bride. M. Al- 
phonse, who had disappeared a moment before taking his 
place at the table, was as pale as death and as solemn as 
an iceberg. He kept drinking old Collioure wme, alnK>st 
as strong as brandy. I was by his side and felt m duty 
bound to warn him. 

"Take care! they say that this wine " 

I have no idea what foolish remark I made, to put myself 
in unison with the other guests. 

He pressed my knee wiSi his and said in a very low tone: 

"When we leave the table, let me have a word with you." 

His solemn tone surprised me. I looked at him more 
closely and noticed the extraordinary change in his ex- 
pression. 

"Are you feding ill?" I asked him. 

"No." 

And he returned to his drinking. 

Meanwhile, amid shouts and clapping of hands, a child 
of eleven years, who had slipped under the table, exhibited 
to the guests a dainty white and rose-coloured ribbon which 
he had taken from the bride's ankle. They called that her 
garter. It was immediately cut into pieces and distributed 
among the yoimg men, who decorated their buttonholes 
with them, according to an ancient custom still observed 
In some patriarchal familes. This episode caused the bride 
to blush to the whites of her eyes. But her confusion 
reached its height when M. de Peyrehorade, having called 
for silence, sang some Catalan verses, impromptu, so he 
said. Their meaning, so far as I understood it, was this: 

"Pray, what is this, my friends? Does the wine I have 
drunk make me see double? There are two Venuses 
here " 



PROSPER M£RIMM 145 

The bridegroom abruptly turned his head away with a 
terrified expression which made everybody laugh. 

"Yes," continued M. de Pe3n:ehorade, "there are two 
Venuses beneadi my roof. One I found in the earth, like 
a trufiSe; the other descended from the skies, has come to 
share her girdle with us." 

He meant to say her garter. 

"My son, choose whichever you prefer — the Roman or the 
Catalan Venus. The rascal chooses the Catalan, and his 
choice is wise. The Roman is black, the Catalan white. 
The Roman is cold, the Catalan inflames all who approach 
her." 

This deliverance caused such an uproar, such noisy ap- 
plause and such roars of laughter, that I thought that the 
ceiling would fall on our heads. There were only three 
sober faces at the table — those of the bride and groom, and 
my own. I had a terrible headache; and then, for some 
unknown reason, a wedding always depresses me. This 
one, in addition, disgusted me more or less. 

The last couplets having been simg by the mayor's dep- 
uty — and they were very free, I must say — we went to 
the salon to make merry over the retirement of the bride, 
who was soon to be escorted to her chamber, for it was 
near midnight. 

M. Alphonse led me into a window recess, and said to 
me, averting his eyes: 

"You will laugh at me, but I don't know what the matter 
is with me; I am bewitched! the devil has got hold me!" 

The first idea that came to my mind was that he believed 
himself to be threatened by some misfortune of the sort 
of which Montigne and Madame de Sevigne speak: 

"The sway of love is always full of tragic episodes," etc. 

"I supposed that accidents of that sort happened only to 
men of intellect," I said to myself. — "You have drunk too 
much Collioure wine, my dear Monsieur Alphonse," I said 
aloud. "I warned you." 

"Yes, that may be. But there is something much more 
torible than that" 



146 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

He spoke in a halting voice. I concluded that he was 
downright tipsy. 

"You remember my ring?" he continued, after a pause. 

"Well! has it been siolen?" 

"No." 

"Then you have it?" 

"No — I — I can't take it off that infernal Venus's fingerl" 

"Nonsense! you didn't pull hard enough." 

"Yes, I did. But the Venus — she has bent her finger." 

He looked me in the eye with a haggard expression, 
leaning against the window-frame to avoid falling. 

"What a fabler" I said. "You pushed the ring on too 
far. To-morrow you can recover it with a pair of pincers. 
But* take care that you don't injure the statue." 

"No, I tell you. The Venus's finger is drawn in, bent; 
she has closed her hand — do you understand? She is my 
wife, apparently, as I have given her my ring. She refuses 
to give it back." 

I felt a sudden shiver, and for a moment I was all goose- 
flesh. Then, as he heaved a profoimd sigh, he sent a puff 
of alcoholic fumes into my face, and all my emotion van- 
ished. 

"The wretch is completely drunk," I thought. 

"You are an antiquary, monsieur," continued the bride- 
groom in a piteous tone; "you know all about these statues; . 
perhaps there is some spring, some devilish contrivance that 
I don't know about. Suppose you were to go out and look?" 

"Willingly," I said; "come with me." 

"No, I prefer that you should go alone." 

I left the salon. 

The weather had changed while we were at supper, and 
the rain was beginning to fall violently. T was about to 
ask for an umbrella when a sudden reflection detained me. 
"I should be a great fool," I said to myself, "to take any 
trouble to verify what an intoxicated man tells me! Per- 
haps, too, he is trying to play some wretched joke on me, 
in order to give these worthy provincials something to laufi^ 
at; and the least that can happen to me is to be dr^ched 
to the skin and to catch a heavy cold." 



PROSPER M6RIM£E 147 

I glanced from the door at the statue, which was drip- 
ping wet, and then went up to my room without returning 
to the salon. I went to bed, but sleep was a long while 
coming. All the scenes of the day passed through my mind. 
I thought of that lovely, pure maiden delivered to the 
tender mercies of a brutal sot. "What a hateful thing a 
mariage de convenance is!" I said to myself. "A mayor 
dons a tri-coloured scarf, a cur6 a stole, and lo! the most 
virtuous girl imaginable is abandoned to the Minotaur! 
Two persons who do not love each other — ^what can they 
have to say at such a moment, which two true lovers would 
purchase at the cost of their lives? Can a woman ever love 
a man whom she has once seen make a beast of himself? 
First impressions are not easily effaced, and I am sure that 
this Monsieur Alphonse well deserves to be detested." 

During my monologue, which I have abridged very 
materially, I had heard much coming and going about the 
house, doors opening and closing, carriages driving away; 
then I fancied that I heard in the hall the light footsteps of 
several women walking toward the farther end of the cor- 
ridor opposite my room. It was probably the procession of 
the bride, who was being escorted to her bedroom. Then 
I heard the steps go downstairs again. Madame de Peyre- 
borade's door closed. 

"How perturbed and ill at ease that poor child must be," 
I thought. 

I turned and twisted in my bed, in an execrable humour. 
A bachelor plays an absurd role in a house where a mar- 
riage is being celebrated. 

Silence had reigned for some time, when it was broken 
by heavy steps ascending the staircase. The wooden stairs 
creaked loudly. 

"What a brute!" I cried. "ITl wager that he will fall 
on the stairs!" 

Everything became quiet once more. I took up a book 
in order to change the current of my thoughts. It was a 
volume of departmental statistics, embellished by an article 
from the pen of M. de Pe3n:ehorade on the druidical re- 



148 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

mains in the arrondissement of Prades. I (dozed at the 
third page. 

I slept badly and woke several times. It might have 
been five o'clodc, and I had been awake more than twenty 
minutes, when a cock crew. Day was just breaking. Sud- 
denly I heard the same heavy steps, the same creaking of 
the stairs that I had heard before I fell asleep. That struck 
me as peculiar. I tried, yawning sleepily, to divine why M. 
Alphonse should rise so early. I could imagine no probable 
cause. I was about to close my eyes again when my atten- 
tion was once more attracted by a strange tramping, to 
which was soon added the jangling of bells and the noise 
of doors violently thrown open; then I distinguished confused 
outcries. 

"My dnmkard must have set fire to something!" I 
thought, as I leaped out of bed. 

I dressed in hot haste and went out into the corridor. 
From the farther end came shrieks and lamentations, and 
one heartrending voice rose above all the rest: "My son! 
my son!" It was evident that something had happened to 
M. Alphonse. I ran to the bridal chamber; it was full of 
people. The first object that caught my eye was the young 
man, half dressed, lying across the bed, tiie framework of 
whidi was broken. He was livid and absolutely motion- 
less. His mother was weeping and shrieking by his side. 
M. de Peyrehorade was bustling about, rubbing his temples 
with eau de cologne, or holding salts to his nose. Alas! 
his son had been dead a long while. 

On a couch, at the other end of the room, was the bride, 
in frightful convulsions. She was uttering incoherent cries, 
and two strong maidservants had all the difficulty in the 
world in holding her. 

"Great God!" T cried, "what has happened!" 

I walked to the bed and raised the unfortimate young 
man's body; it was already cold and stiff. His clenched 
teeth and livid face expressed the most horrible anguish. 
It seemed perfectly evident that his death had been a vio- 
lent one, and the death agony indescribably terrible. But 
there was no sign of Wo'^ cm hu clothes. I opened his 



PROSPER M&RIMM 149 

shirt and found on his breast a purple mark which extended 
around the loins and across the back. One would have 
said that he had been squeezed by an iron ring. My foot 
came in contact with something hard on the carpet; I 
stooped and saw the diamond ring. 

I dragged M. jie Peyrehorade and his wife to their room; 
then I caused the bride to be taken thither. 

"You still have a daughter," I said to them; "you owe 
to her your devoted care." 

Then I left them alone. 

It seemed to me to be beyond question that M. Alphonse 
had been the victim of a murder, the authors of which 
had found a way to introduce themselves into the bride's 
bedroom at night. The marks on the breast and their 
circular character puzzled me a good deal, however, for a 
club or an iron bar could not have produced them. Sud- 
denly I remembered having heard that in Valencia the 
bravi used long leather bags filled with fine sand to murder 
people whom they were hired to kill. I instantly recalled 
the Aragonese muleteer and his threat; and yet I hardly 
dared think that he would have wreaked such a terrible 
vengeance for a trivial jest. 

I walked about the house, looking everywhere for traces 
of a break, and finding nothing. I went down into the 
garden, to see whether the assassins might have forced their 
way in on that side of the house; but I found no definite 
in^cations. Indeed, the rain of the preceding night had so 
saturated the ground that it could not have retained any 
distinct impression. I observed, however, several very deep 
footprints; they pointed in two opposite directions, but in 
the same line, leading from the comer of the hedge next the 
tennis court to the gateway of the house. They might well 
be M. Alphonse's steps when he went out to take his ring 
from the finger of the statue. On the other hand, the 
hedge was less dense at that point than elsewhere, and the 
murderers might have passed through it there. As I went 
back and forth in front of the statue, I paused a moment to 
look at it. That time, I will confess, I was unable to con- 
template without terror its expression of devilish irony; 



ISO THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

and, with my head full of the horrible scenes I had wit- 
nessed, I fancied that I had before me an infernal divinity, 
exulting over the disaster that had stricken the house. 

I returned to my room and remained there till noon. 
Then I went out and inquired concerning my hosts. They 
were a little calmer. Mademoiselle de Puygarrig — I should 
say M. Alphonse*s widow — ^had recovered her senses. She 
had even talked with the king's attorney from Perpignan, 
then on circuit at Ille, and that magistrate had taken her 
deposition. He desired mine also. I told him what I knew 
and made no secret of my suspicions of the Aragonese mule- 
teer. He ordered that he should be arrested immediately. 

"Did you learn anything from Madame Alphonse?" I 
asked the king's attorney, when my deposition was written 
out and signed. 

"That unfortunate yoimg woman has gone mad," he re- 
plied, with a sad smile. "Mad! absolutely mad! This is 
what she told me: 

"She had been in bed, she said, a few minutes, with the 
curtain drawn, when her bedroom door opened and some 
one came in. At that time Madame Alphonse was on the 
inside of the bed, with her face towards the wall. Sup- 
posing, of course, that it was her husband, she did not 
move. A moment later, the bed creaked as if under an 
enormous weight. She was terribly frightened, but dared 
not turn her head. Five minutes, ten minutes perhaps, — she 
can only guess at the time — ^passed in this way. Then she 
made an involuntary movement, or else the odier person in 
the bed made one, and she felt the touch of something as 
cold as ice — that was her expression. She moved closer 
to the wall, trembling in every limb. Shortly after, the 
door opened a second time, and some one came in, who said: 
'Good-evening, my little wife.' Soon the curtains were 
drawn aside. She heard a stifled cry. The person who was 
in the bed by her side sat up and seemed to put out its 
arms. Thereupon she turned her head, and saw, so she 
declares, her husband on his knees beside the bed, with his 
head on a level with the pillow, clasped in the arms of a 
sort of greenish giant, who was squeezing him with terrible 



PROSPER M&RIMSE 151 

force. She says— and she repeated it twenty times, pocnr 
woman ! — she says that she recognised — can you guess whom? 
—the bronze Venus, M. de Peyrehorade's statue. Since 
she 19Z& unearthed, the whole neighbourhood dreams of her. 
But I continue the story of that unhappy mad woman. At 
that sight she lost consciousness, and it is probable that 
she had lost her reason some moments before.. She could 
give me no idea at all how long she remained in her swoon. 
Recovering her senses, she saw the phantom, or, as she still 
insists, the statue, motionless, with its legs and the lower 
part of the body in the bed, the bust and arms stretched 
out, and in its arms her husband, also motionless. A cock 
crew. Thereupon the statue got out of bed, dropped the 
dead body, and left the room. Madame Alphonse rushed 
for the bdl-cord, and you know the rest." 

The Spaniard was arrested; he was calm, and defended 
himself with much self-possession and presence of mind. 
He did not deny making the remark I had overheard; but 
he eiqplained it by saying that he had meant simply this: 
that, on the following day, having rested meanwhile, he 
would beat his victorious rival at tennis. I remember that 
he added: 

"An Aragonese, when he is insulted, doesn't wait until 
the next day for his revenge. If I had thought that Mon- 
sieur Alphonse intended to insult me, I would have driven 
my knife into his belly on the spot." 

His shoes were compared wiUi the footprints in the gar- 
den, and were found to be much larger. 

Lastly, the innkeeper at whose house he was staying de- 
posed that he had passed the whole night rubbing and doc- 
toring one of his mules, which was si(£. Furthermore, the 
Aragonese was a man of excellent reputation, well known 
in the province, where he came every year in the course 
of his business. So he was released with apologies. 

I have forgotten the deposition of a servant, who was the 
last person to see M. Alphonse alive. It was just as he 
was going up to his wife; he called the man and asked him 
with evident anxiety if he knew where I was. The servant 
replied that he nad not seen me. Thereiqxm M. Alphonse 



IS2 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

sighed and stood more than a minute without speaking; 
then he said: 

"Well/ the devil must have taken him away, too/'* 

I asked him if M. Alphonse had his diamond ring on his 
finger when he spoke to him. The servant hesitated before 
he replied; at last he said that he did not think so, but 
that he had not noticed particularly. 

"If he had had that ring on his finger," he added upon 
reflection, "I should certainly have noticed it, for I thought 
that he had given it to Madame Alphonse." 

As I questioned this man, I was conscious of a touch of 
the superstitious terror with which Madame Alpdionse's de- 
position had infected the whole household. The king's 
attorney glanced at me with a smile, and I did not persist. 

Some hours after M. Alphonse's fmieral, I prepared to 
leave Ille. M. de Peyrehorade's carriage was to take me 
to Perpignan. Despite his enfeebled condition, the poor 
old man insisted upon attending me to his garden gate. We 
passed through the garden in silence; he, hardly able to 
drag himself alone, leaning on my arm. As we were about 
to part, I cast a last glance at the Venus. I foresaw that 
my host, although he did not share the terror and detesta- 
tion which she inspired in a portion of his family, would 
be glad to be rid of an object which would constantly remind 
him of a shocking calamity. It was my purpose to urge 
him to place it in some museum. I hesitated about opening 
the subject, when M. de Peyrehorade mechanically turned 
his head in the direction in which he saw that I was gazing 
earnestly. His eye fell upon the statue, and he instantly 
burst into tears. I embraced him, and, afraid to say a 
single word, entered the carriage. 

I never learned, subsequent to my departwe, that any 
new light had been thrown upon that mysterious catastrophe. 

M. de Peyrehorade died a few months after his son. By 
his will he bequeathed to me his manuscripts, which I shall 
publish some day, perhaps. I foiuid among them no memoir 
relating to the inscriptions on the Venus. 

P. S. — ^My friend M. de P. has recently written me fram 



PROSPER M&RIMM 153 

Papignan that the statue no longer exists. After her hus- 
band's death, Madame de Pe3n:ehorade's first care was to 
have it melted into a bell, and in that new shape it is now 
used in the church at Ille. 

"But," M. de P. adds, "it would seem that an evil fate 
pursues all those who possess that bronze. Since that bdl 
has rung at Ille the vines have frozen twice." 

1837. 



HERODIAS 

(Hirodias) 
By GUSTAVE FLAUBERT 



THE citadel of Machaerus stood on the eastern shore of 
the Dead Sea, on a cone-shaped basaltic peak. Four 
deep valleys surrounded it, two on the sides, one in 
front, the fourth behind. Houses clustered about its base, 
within the enclosure formed by a wall which rose and fell 
with the undulations of the ground; and by a zigzag road, 
hewn in the rock, the town was connected with the fortress, 
whose walls were one hundred and twenty cubits high, with 
many angles, battlements on the edge, and here and there 
towers, forming the omamentaion, as it were, of that crown 
of stone, suspended over the abyss. 

Within there was a palace, adorned with porticoes and 
sheltered by a terrace, about which ran a balustrade of 
sycamore-wood, with tall poles arranged to hold a tent 

One morning, before dawn, the Tetrarch Herod Antipas 
leaned on the balustrade and looked forth. 

Immediately beneath him the mountains were banning 
to show their peaks, while their dense masses, to the lowest 
depths of the ravines, were still in shadow. The hovering 
mist was rent asunder, and the outlines of the Dead Sea 
appeared. The dawn, breaking behind Maduerus, diffused 
a reddish light. Soon it illuminated the sands on the shore, 
the hills, the desert, and, farther away, all the mountams 
of Judea, with their jagged gray slopes. En-Gedi, in the 

Translated by George Bumham Ives. Copyright, 1903, 1^ 
G. P. Putnam's Sons. 

IS4 



GUSTAVE FLAUBERT 155 

centre, formed a black bar; Hebron, in the backgroimd, 
was rounded like a dome; Eshtaol was covered with pome- 
granates, Sorek with vineyards, Carmel with iields of sesame; 
and the Tower of Antonia, with its monstrous cube, domin- 
ated Jerusalem. The Tetrarch turned his eyes to the right, 
to gaze upon the palm-trees of Jericho; and he thought of 
the other cities of his Galilee: Capernaum, Endor, Naza- 
reth, Tiberias, whither perhaps he would never go again. 
Meanwhile the Jordan flowed through the barren plain. 
All white, it was as dazzling as a field of snow. Now the 
lake seemed to be of lapis lazuli; and at its southern point, 
in the direction of Yemen, Antipas saw what he dreaded to 
see. Brown tents were scattered here and there; men with 
lances went to and fro among the horses; and dying fires 
gleamed like sparks, level with the ground. 

They were the troops of the King of the Arabs, whose 
daughter he had cast aside to take Herodias, wife to one of 
his brothers, who lived in Italy with no pretension to power. 

Antipas was awaiting succour from the Romans; and as 
Vitellius, Governor of Syria, did not appear, he was con- 
sumed with impatience. 

Doubtless Agrippa had ruined him in the mind of the 
Emperor? Philip, his third brother, sovereign of Batanea, 
was secretly arming. The Jews would have no more of 
his idolatrous customs, nor all the rest of his domineering 
sway; so that he was hesitating between two plans: to be- 
guile the Arabs, or to enter into an alliance with the 
Parthians; and, on the pretext of celebrating his birthday, 
he had bidden to a great banquet, for that very day, the 
leaders of his troops, the stewards of his estates, and the 
chief men of Galilee. With a keen glance he scanned all 
the roads. They were empty. Eagles flew over his head; 
the soldiers were sleeping against the walls, along the ram- 
parts; nothing stirred within the castle. 

Of a sudden a voice in the distance, as if escaping from 
the bowels of the earth, made the Tetrarch turn pale. He 
leaned forward to listen; it had ceased. It began again, 
and he clapped his hands and called: 

"MannaeusI MamueusI'' 



iS6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

A man appeared, naked to the waist, like the masseurs at 
baths. He was very tall, aged, fieshless, and wore at his 
hip a cutlass in a copper sheath. His hair, brushed back 
and held in place by a comb, exaggoated the hei^t of 
his brow. His eyes were duU with drowsiness, but his 
teeth gleamed and his toes rested lightly on the flagstones, 
his whole body having the suppleness of a monkey and his 
face the impassiveness of a mummy. 

"Where is he?" asked the Tetrarch. 

Mannaeus replied, pointing with his thumb to something 
behind them: 

"There! still there!" 

"I thought that I heard him!" 

And Antipas, having drawn a long breath of relief, in- 
quired concerning laokanann, the same man whom the 
Latins called St. John the Baptist. Had those two men 
been seen again who had been admitted as a favour to hb 
dungeon some months before; and had the purpose with 
whidi they had come been learned since? 

Mannaeus replied: 

"They exchanged some words v^th him in secret, like 
thieves at a cross-roads in the night. Then they went away 
towards Upper Galilee, announcmg that they were the 
bearers of great tidings." 

Antipas hung his head, then exclaimed in a tone of alarm: 

"Keep him! keep him! And let no one enter I Lock 
the door fast! Cover the hole! None must even suq)ect 
that he lives!" 

Before receiving these orders Mannaeus had carried them 
out; for laokanann was a Jew; and, like all Samaritans^ he 
abhorred the Jews. 

Their temple of Gerizim, intended by Moses to be the 
centre of Israel, had ceased to exist since the time of Sling 
Hyrcanus; and that of Jerusalem drove them to frenzy as 
an outrage and a lasting injustice. Mannaeus had made 
his way into it in order to sully the altar with dead men's 
bones. His confederates, less swift of foot than he, had 
been beheaded. 

He saw it in the gap between two hills. Its white maxble 



GUSTA VE FLA UBERT 157 

"walls and the golden lines of its roof shone resplendent in 
the sun. It was like a luminous mountain — something su- 
perhuman, crushing all else by its magnificence and its pride. 

Then he extended his arms towards Zion; and, standing 
erect, with head thrown back and fists clenched, he hurled 
a malediction at it, believing that words had real power. 

Antipas listened and did not seem shocked. 

The Samaritan continued: 

"At times he becomes excited, he longs to fly, he hopes 
for a rescue. At other times he has &e tranquil aspect 
of a sick beast; or else I see him walking to and fro in the 
darkness, saying: 'What matters it? That He may grow 
great, I must needs shrink!'" 

Antipas and Mannaeus glanced at each other. But the 
Tetrarch was weary of reflection. 1 

All those moimtains about him, like terraces of huge 
petrified waves, the black ravines on the sides of the cliffs, 
the immensity* of the blue vault, the brilliant glamour of the 
day, the depth of the abysses, disturbed him; and ^ wave 
of desolation swept over him at the spectacle of the desert, 
which, in the upheavals of its surface, formed amphitheatres 
and ruined palaces. The hot wind brought, with the odour 
of sulphur, an exhalation, as it were, from the accursed cities, 
buried lower than the banks beneath the heavy waters of the 
lake. These tokens of an immortal wrath brought dismay 
to his mind; and he stood, with both elbows on the balus- 
trade, staring eyes, and his hands pressed against his temples. 
Some one touched him. He turned. Herodias stood before 
him. 

A light purple robe covered her to the sandals. Having 
come forth hurriedly from her chamber, she wore neither 
necklace nor earrings; a tress of her black hair fell over 
one arm, and its end was lost to sight between her breasts. 
Her two open nostrils throbbed; a joyous expression of 
triumph lighted up her face; and in a loud voice, shaking the 
Tetrarch 's arm, ihe said: 

"Caesar loves us! Agrippa is in prison I" 

"Who told you so?" 

"I know it" 



1S8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

She added: 

"It is for having aspired to Caius's* emiurel" 

While living on their alms, he had schenwd to obtain 
the title of ^g, which they, like him, coveted. But in 
the future no more fear! 'Tiberius's dungeons are hard 
to open, and sometimes life is not secure therein I'' 

Antipas imderstood her; and, although she was Affijpp9L*s 
sister, her atrocious pmpose seemed to him justified. Such 
murders were a consequence of the state of affurs, a fatality 
attached to royal families. In Herod's they had become 
too numerous to count. 

Then she set forth her plan: clients bought, letters dis- 
covered, spies at every door; and how she had succeeded in 
seducing Eutyches the denouncer. '^Nothing deterred mel 
Have I not done even more for you? I have abandoned 
my daughter!" 

After her divorce she had left the child in Rome, hoping 
to have others by the Tetrarch. She never mentioned her. 
He wondered why that outburst of affection. 

The tent had been spread, and huge cushions were speedily 
brought to them. Herodias sank upon them and wept, turn- 
ing her head to him. Then she passed her hand over her 
eyes, said that she propose to think no more about it, that 
she was happy; and she recalled to his mind their chats 
yonder in the atrium, their meetings at the baths, their 
strolls along the Via Sacra, and the evenings at the great 
villas, amid the plashing of foimtains, beneath arches of 
flowers, by the Roman Campagna. She gazed at him as 
of yore, nibbing agamst his breast, with cajoling gestures. 
He pushed her away. The love that she tried to kindle 
was so far away now! And all his misforttmes had flowed 
from it; for war had raged well-nigh twelve years. It had 
aged the Tetrarch. His shoulders were bent; in his sad- 
coloured toga with a violet border, his white hwr blended 
with his beard, and the sun, shining throudi the veil, bathed 
with light his troubled brow. Herodias's too was wrinkled; 
and, seated face to face, they eyed each other fiercdy. 

llie roads over the mountam began to be peopled. Herds* 

*The Emperor Caligula. — [Trans.] 



GUST A VE FLA UBERT 1 59 

men drove their cattle, children dragged donkeys along, 
grooms led horses. Those who descended the heists above 
Machaenis disappeared behind the castle; others ascended 
the ravine opposite, and, having reached the town, discharged 
their burdens in the courtyards. They were the Tetrardi's 
purveyors, and servants preceding his guests. 

But, at the foot of the terrace, on the left, an Essene ap- 
peared, in a white robe, barefooted, with a stoical air. 
Mannaeus, on the right, rushed forward, brandishing bis 
cutlass 

"Kill him!" cried Herodias. 

"Hold!" said the Tetrarch. 

He stood still; the other did likewise. 

Then they withdrew, each by a different stairway, walk« 
ing backward, keeping their eyes fixed on each other. 

"I know him!" said Herodias; "his name is Phanuel, and 
he seeks speech with laokanann, since you are blind aiough 
to spare his life!" 

Antipas suggested that he might some day be of use. 
His attacks upon Jerusalem woi^d win to their side the 
rest of the Jews. 

"No!" she said; "they accept all masters and are not 
capable of forming a fatherland!" As for him who stirred 
the people with hopes never lost since the days of Nehemiah, 
the best policy was to suppress him. 

There was no need of haste in the Tetrarch's opinion, 
laokanann dangerous! Folly! he feigned to laugh at the 
idea. 

"Hold your peace!" And she repeated the tale of her 
humiliation one day when she was going towards Gilead to 
gather balsam. People were putting on their clothes on 
the bank of a stream. On a low h^ near by a man was 
speaking. He had a camel's skin about his loins, and his 
head resembled a lion's. "As soon as he saw me he spit 
out at me all the maledictions of the prophets. His eyes 
shot fire; his voice roared; he raised his arms as if to tear 
the thunder from on high. Impossible to fly! the wheels of 
my chariot were buried in sand to the axles; and I drove 
away slowly, sheltering myself beneath my doak, my blood 



i6o THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

congealed by those insults, which fell like a shower of rain." 

laokanann made life impossible to her. When he was 
taken and bound with cords, the soldiers were ord^ed to 
stab him if he resisted; he was as gentle as a land). They 
had put serpents in his dimgeon; they were dead. 

The futility of these tricks drove Herodias mad. Be- 
sides, what was the cause of his war against her? What 
interest guided him? His harangues, delivered to crowds, 
were circulated, spread abroad; she heard them everywhere, 
they filled the air. Against legions she would have been 
stout of heart. But that power, more harmful than the 
sword, and intangible, was stupefying, and she paced the 
terrace, livid with wrath, lacking words to express the pas- 
sion that suffocated her. 

She reflected, too, that the Tetrarch, yielding to public 
opinion, would perhaps deem it best to cast her off. In that 
case all would be lost I From childhood she had cheri^ed 
the dream of mighty empire. It was to attain it that, de- 
serting her first husband, she had allied herself to this one, 
who, she thought, had deceived her. 

'^I obtained a powerful support when I entered your 
family!" 

"It is equal to yours!" rejoined the Tetrarch, simply. 

Herodias felt the blood of the priests and kings who were 
her ancestors boiling in her veins. 

"But your grandfather swept the temple of Ascalon! The 
others were ^epherds, bandits, heads of caravans, a wan- 
dering horde, subject to Judah from the time of King 
David! All my ancestors vanquished yours! The first of 
the Maccabees drove you forth from Hebron; Hyrcanus 
forced you to be circumcised!" And, giving voit to the 
patrician's scorn for the plebeian, Jacob's hatred of Edom,* 
she reproached him for his indifference to insults, for his 
mildness towards the Phoenecians, who betrayed him, his 
cowardly subservience to the people, who detested him. 
"You are like them, admit it! And you sigh for the Arab 
girl who danced around the stones! Take her! Go, live 
with her, in her rq^nv5»« >ioij«:p» "'^ op ''ler bread cooked 



GUSTA VE FLA UBERT i6i 

in the ashes; drink the curdled milk of her sheepi kiss her 
blue cheeks! and forget me I" 

The Tetrarch was no longer listening. He was gazing 
at the roof of a house, on which there was a young girl, and 
an old woman holding a parasol with a reed handle as 
long as a fisher's line. In the centre of the rug stood a 
great travelling-basket, open. Girdles, veils, jewels over- 
flowed from it in a confused mass. Now and again the girl 
stooped towards those objects and shook them in the air. 
She was dressed like the Roman women, in a wrinkled timic, 
with a peplum adorned with emerald tassels; and blue bands 
confined her hair, which was doubtless too heavy, for from 
time to time she put her hand to it. The shadow of the 
parasol hovered above her, half hiding her. Twice or thrice 
Antipas caught a glimpse of her shapely neck, the comer 
of an ear, or of a tiny mouth. But he saw her whole figure, 
from the hips to the neck, as she bent forward and drew 
herself up again with supple grace. He watched for the 
repetition of that movement, and his breath came faster; 
flames kindled in his eyes. Herodias observed him. 

He asked: "Who is she?" 

She answered that she had no knowledge, and left him, 
suddenly appeased. 

The Tetrarch was awaited imder the porticoes by the 
Galileans, the master of the writings, the chief of the pas- 
turage, the director of the salt-wells, and a Jew of Babylon, 
in command of his horsemen. All hailed him with loud 
acclamations. Then he vanished towards the inner cham- 
bers. 

Phanuel appeared at the angle of a passage. 

"Ah, again? You came to sec laokanann doubtless?" 

"And you I I have to tell you something of moment." 

And, following Antipas, he altered, at his heels, a dark 
apartment. 

The light entered through a barred opening that extended 
along the wall under the cornice. The walls were painted 
a dark pomegranate colour, almost black. At the aid 
stood an ebony bed, with cords of ox-hide. A golden buck- 
ler, above, gleamed like a sun. 



x62 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Antipas walked the whole length of the rooniy and lay 
down on the bed. 

Fhanud was standing. He raised his ann, and said in the 
attitude of one inspired: 

'^The Most High sends one of his sons to earth now and 
again. laokanann is such an one. If you oi^iress him 
you will be punished." 

"It is he who persecutes me!" cried Antipas. "He 
demanded of me an impossible act. Since then he has rent 
me. And I was not harsh at the b^inningl He has even 
sent forth from Machaerus men who overturn my provmces. 
JV curse upon his life! Since he attacks me, I defend 
myself!" 

"His fits of anger are too violent," replied Fhanud. "No 
matter I He must be set free." 

"One does not set free raging beasts!" said the Tetrardi. 

"Have no fear," the Essene replied. "He will go hence 
to the Arabs, the Gauls, the Scythians. His work is des- 
tined to reach to the ends of the earth!" 

Antipas seemed lost in a vision. 

"His power is mighty! Against my will, I love him." 

"Then let him be free!" 

The Tetrarch shook his head. He feared Herodias, 
Mannaeus, and the unknown. 

Phanuel strove to persuade him, alleging as a guaranty 
of his plans the submission of the Essenes to the King. 
People respected those poor men, unconquerable by torture, 
always clad in flax, and able to read the future in the stars. 

Antipas recalled the words he had let fall a moment before. 

"What is this thing which you said was of moment?" 

A negro appeared. His body was white with dust He 
gasped for breath and could only say: 

"Vitellius!" 

*What! has he arrived?" 

"I saw him. Within three hours he will be here!** 

The portieres at the doors of the corridors were separated 
as by the wind. A busy hum filled the castle, a tumult 
of people runninc; to and fro, of furniture beinc: dragged 
about, of silver nlate falling to the floor; and from the toweis 
trumpets sounded, to call the scattered slaves* 



GUSTAVE FUVBERT 
II 

The ramparts were thronged with people when Vitellius 
entered the courtyard. He was leaning on his inter- 
preter's arm, followed by a great red litter adorned with 
plumes and mirrors; he wore the toga, the laticlave, the 
buskins of a consul, and his person was surrounded by lictors. 

They leaned against the door their twelve fasces — staves 
boimd together by a strap, with an axe in the centre. 
Thereupon one and all trembled before the majesty of the 
Roman people. 

The litter, borne by eight men, stopped. Then stepped 
forth a youth with a fat paunch, a blotched face, and pearls 
along his fingers. He was offered a glass of wine and 
spices. He drank it and demanded a second. 

The Tetrarch had fallen at the Proconsul's feet, grieved, 
he said, that he had not been sooner informed of the 
favour of his presence. Otherwise he would have 'ordered 
that whatever the Vitellil might require should await thera 
along the roads. They were descended from the goddess 
Vitellia. A road leading from Janiculum to the sea still 
bore their name. QuastorsbJps and consulships were innu- 
merable in the family; and as for Lucius, now his guest, 
they owed thanks to him as the conqueror of the Qiti and 
as the father of the young Aulus,* who seemed to be re- 
turning to his own domain, snce the Orient was the father- 
land of the gods. 

These hyperbolical compliments were delivered in Latin. 
Vitellius accepted them impas^vely. 

He replied that the great Herod sufficed to make a nation 
glorious. The Athenians had entrusted to him the man- 
agement of the Olympic games. He had built temples in 
honour of Augustus, had been patient, ingenious, awe-in- 
spiring, and always loyal to the Cxsai^ 

Between the pillars, with tbdr brazen c^itals, Herodias 
was seen, advancing with the air of an empress, amid 
women and eunuchs carrying burning perfumes on sUva- 
gilt salvers. 

'Afterwards the Emperor Vitellius. — [Trans.] 



i64 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

The Proconsul took three steps to meet her; and, having 
saluted him with an inclination of the head: 

"What joy!" she cried; ''henceforth, Agrippa, the enemy 
of Tiberius, is powerless to do harm!" 

He knew notiiing of the event; it seemed to him perilous; 
and as Antipas swore that he would do ev^ything for the 
Emperor, Vitellius added: ''Even to the injury of others?" 

He bad taken hostages from the King of tbe Parthians, 
and the Emperor bad forgotten it; for Antipas, being pres- 
ent at the conference, to give himself importaioce, had in- 
stantly despatched the news. Hence a deq>-rooted hatred, 
and delay in sending succour. 

The Tetrarcb stammered, but Aulus said, laugjiing: 

"Fear not; I will protect you I" 

The Proconsul pretended not to have heard. The father's 
fortune depended on the son's debasonent; and that flower 
from the mire of Caprae procured him advantages so con- 
siderable that he encompassed it with attentions, distrusting 
it all the while because it was poisonous. 

A tumult arose beneath the gate. A file of white mules 
was led in, ridden by persons in priestly costume. They 
were Sadducees and Pharisees, led to Machaerus by thi 
same object of ambition, the first wishing to obtiun the 
honourable post of sacrificer, the others to retain it. Their 
faces were dark, especially those of the Pharisees, foes of 
Rome and of the Tetrarch. The skirts of their tunics 
embarrassed them in the press; and their tiaras rested in- 
securely on their brows, above bands of parchment, where- 
on words were written. 

At almost the same time some soldiers of the vanguard 
arrived. They had placed their shields in bags, to protect 
them from the dust; and behind them was Marcellus, lieu- 
tenant to the Proconsul, with publicans carrying tablets of 
wood under their armpits. 

Antipas named the principal persons of his suite: Tolmai, 
Kanthera, Sebon, Ammonius, of Alexandria, who bou^t 
asphalt for him, Naaman, captain of his velites, and Jacim 
the Babylonian. 

Vitellius had observed Mamueus. 



GUST A VE FLA UBERT 165 

"Who is that man?" 

The Tetrarch, with a gesture, gave him to understand 
that he was the executioner. 

Then he presented the Sadducees. 

Jonathas, a small man of free manners, speaking Greek, 
begged the master to honour them by a visit to Jerusalem. 
— He would probably go thither. 

Eleazar, with hooked nose and long beard, demanded for 
the Pharisees the cloak of the high priest, detained in the 
Tower of Antonia by the civil authorities. 

Then the Galileans denounced Pontius Pilate. Taking 
advantage of the art of a madman who was seeking David's 
vessel of gold in a cave near Samaria, he had killed some of 
the inhabitants. And they all spoke at once, Mannaeus with 
more violence than the others. Vitellius declared that the 
criminals shouW be pimished. 

Loud exclamations arose in front of a portico where 
the soldiers had hung their shields. The coverings being 
removed, there was seen on the bosses the image of Caesar. 
That, to the Jews, was idolatry. Antipas harangued them, 
while Vitellius, from an elevated seat on the colonnade, 
looked on in amazement at their wrath. Tiberius had done 
well to bani^ four hundred of them to Sardinia. But at 
home they were strong; and he ordered the bucklers to be 
removed. 

Thereupon they surrounded the Proconsul, imploring 
reparation for injustice, privileges, alms. Clothes were 
torn, they trampled upon one another; and, to make room, 
slaves struck right and left with staves. Those nearest the 
gateway went down to the road;. others ascended it; the 
tide flowed back; two currents met in that mass of men, 
which swayed back and forth, hemmed in by the encircling 
walls. 

Vitellius asked why there were so many people. Antipas 
told him the reason: his birthday festival; and he pointed 
out several of his people, who leaned over the battlements, 
lowering enormous baskets of meat, fruit, vegetables, ante- 
lopes and storks, large sky-blue fish, grapes, melons, pome- 
granates arranged in p3n*amids. Aulus could not restrain 



i66 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

himself. He rushed towards the kitchen, impdled by that 
gluttony which was destined to surprise the universe. 

Passing a cave, he saw stew-pans like cuirasses. Vitdlius 
came to look at them, and donanded that the underground 
rooms of the fortress shoidd be opened for him. 

They were he^vn in the rock, mih high vaulted roofs^ and 
pillars at intervals. The first contained old armour, but 
the second was filled to overflowing with pikes, all their 
points protruding from a bouquet of plumes. The third 
seemed to be hung with mats of reeds, the slender arrows 
were arranged so straightly side by side. Sdmitar-blades 
covered the walls of the fourth. In the caitre of the fifth, 
rows of helmets, with their crests, formed as it were a bat- 
talion of red serpents. In the sixth naught could be seen 
save quivers; in the seventh, naught but military boots; in 
the eighth, naught but armlets; in those following, pitch- 
forks, grappling-irons, ladders, ropes, and evoi poles for 
catapults, even bells for the breastplates of dromedariesl 
And as the mountain grew larger at its base, and was hol- 
lowed out within like a beehive, beneath these rooms fheie 
were others more numerous and deeper. 

Vitellius, Phineas his interpreter, and Sisenna, the leader 
of the publicans, walked through them by the lig^t of 
torches borne by three eunuchs. 

In the shadow they distinguished hideous objects Invented 
by the barbarians: head-crushers studded with nails, jave- 
lins that poisoned the woimds they made, pincers resembling 
a crocodile's jaws; in a word, the Tetrarch had in store in 
Machaenis munitions of war for forty thousand men. 

He had gathered them in anticipation of an alliance of 
his enemies. But the Proconsul might believe, or say, that 
it was to fight agauist the Romans, and the Tetrarch sought 
explanations. 

They were not his; many were used for protection against 
brigands; moreover, they were needed against the Arabs; 
or else, they had all belonged to his father. And, instead 
of walking behind the Proconsul, he went before, at a 
rapid pace. Then he stood against the wall, which he cov- 
ered with his toga, holding his elbows away from his sides; 



CUSTAVB PLAVB6RT ttj 

but the top of a door appeared above his head. \^tdliiiS ' 
noticed it and wished to Imow what was on the other side. 

The Babylonian alone could open it 

''Can the Babylonian!" 

They awaited his coming. 

His father had come from the shores of the Eiqdirates. 
to offer his services to Herod the Great, with four hundvee 
horsemen, to defend the eastern frontier. After the par- 
tition of the kingdom, Jadm had remained in FhiUp'a 
service, and now served Antipas. 

He appeared, v^th a bow over his shoulder, a wiiip in his 
hand. Cords of many colours were tied ti^tly about hb 
crooked legs. His huge arms emerged from a sleeveless 
tunic, and a fur cap cast its shadow over his face, ^Aich 
bore a beard curled in rings. 

At first he seemed not to understand the interpreter. But 
Vitellius cast a glance at Antipas, who instantly rq)eated 
his command. Thereupon Jadm placed both his hands 
against the door. It glided into the wall. 

A breath of hot air came forth frc^n the darkness. A 
winding path slop^ downward; they followed it and readied 
the aitrance to a grotto, of greater extent than the other 
underground apartments. 

At the rear there was an arched opening over the preci- 
pice, which defended the dts^d on that side. The blossoms 
of a honeysuckle that dung to the wall hung downward in 
the bright light of day. Along the ground trickled a mur- 
muring thread of water. 

There were white horses there, a hundred perhaps, eating 
barley from a board on a levd with thdr mouths. All had 
thdr manes painted blue, thdr hoofs in bags of esparto, and 
the hair between the ears curled over die frontal bone, 
like a wig. With thdr very long tails they lazily lashed 
their legs. The Proconsul was strudL dumb with admira- 
tion. 

They were marvdlous creatures, supple as serpents, lig^t 
as birds. They would keep pace with thdr riders* arrows, 
overturn men and bite them in the abdomen, traverse the 
mountainous country with ease, leap ravines^ and ooHtimie 



i68 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

their wild gallop over the level ground throu^ a whole 
day. A word woidd stop them. As soon as Jadm en- 
tered, they went to him, like sheep when the shepherd 
appears, and, stretching out their nedus, gazed at him rest- 
lessly with their childlike eyes. From habit, he uttered a 
hoarse cry from the bottom of his throat, which aroused 
their spirits; and they reared, hungiy for space, begg^ 
leave to nm. 

Antipas, fearing that Vitellius might take them, had im- 
prisoned them in that place, specially deigned for animals 
in case of siege. 

"It is a bad stable," said the Proconsul, "and you run 
the risk of losing them! Count them, Sisennal" 

The publican took a tablet from his girdle, counted the 
horses and wrote the number. 

The agents of the fiscal companies bribed the provincial 
governors, in order to pillage the provinces. This one smdt 
everywhere, with his polecat's jaw and his blinking eyes. 

At last they went up again to the courtyard. 

Bronze shields, set in the pavement here and there, cov- 
ered the cisterns. He noticed one larger than the rest, 
which had not their sonority beneath the feet. He struck 
them all in turn, then shouted, stamping: 

"I have it! I have it! Herod's treasure is here I" 

The search for his treasure was a mania among the 
Romans. 

It did not exist, the Tetrarch swore. 

But what was there beneath? 

"Nothing! a man, a prisoner." 

"Show him to me!" said Vitellius. 

The Tetrarch did not obey; the Jews would have learned 
his secret. His disinclination to raise the shield angered 
Vitellius. 

"Break it in!" he shouted to the lictors. 

ManncTus had divined what was happening. Seeing an 
axe, he thought that they were going to behead laokanann 
' — and he stopped the lictor at the first blow on the brcmze 
circle, inserted a sort of hook between it and the pave- 
ment, then, straightening his long, thin arms, slowly raised 



GUST A VE FLA UBERT 1 69 

it; it opened^ and all marvelled at the old man's strength. 
Beneath the wood-lined cover was a trapdoor of the same 
dimensions. At a blow of the fist it folded in two panels; 
then they saw a hole, a great ditch, surrounded by a stair- 
case without a rail; and they who leaned over the brink 
saw at the bottom something indistinct and horrifying. 

A human being lay on the ground, covered wiSi long 
hair that mingled with the beast's hair that clothed his 
back. He rose; his brow touched a horizontal grating; 
and from time to time he disappeared in the depths of his 
den. 

The sun gleamed on the points of the tiaras and on the 
sword-hilts, and heated the flagstones beyond measure; and 
doves, flying from the eaves, fluttered above the courtyard. 
It was the hour when Mannxus usually threw grain to 
them. He crouched before the Tetrarch, who stood beside 
Vitellius. The Galileans, the priests, the soldiers, formed 
a circle behind them; all held their peace, in agonising 
suspense as to what was about to happen. 

First there was a profound sigh, uttered in a cavernous 
voice. 

Herodias heard it at the other end of the palace. Over- 
come by a sort of fascination, she passed through the 
crowd; and with one hand on Mannaeus's shoulder, and body 
bent forward, she listened. 

The voice arose. 

"Woe to you, Pharisees and Sadducees, generation of 
vipers, inflated skins, tinkling cymbals!" 

They recognized laokanann. His name passed from 
mouth to mouth. Others hastened to the spot. 

"Woe unto you, O people! woe to the traitors of Judah, 
to the drurikards of Ephraim, to those who dwell in the 
fat valleys and who are overcome with wine! 

"Let ihem fade away like the water that flows, like the 
snail that melts as it crawls, like the foetus of a woman who 
does not see the sun. 

"Thou must take refuge, O Moab, among the cypresses 
like the ^>arrows, in caverns like the jerboa. The gates of 
the fortresses shall be rent asunder more easily than nut- 



170 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

sfaeHs, walls shall crumble, cities shall bum; and the scourge 
of the Eternal shall not rest. He shall turn your lin& 
about in your blood as wool is turned in the dyer's vat 
He shall tear you like a new harrow; He shall scatter mor- 
sels of your flesh upon the moimtainsi" 

Of what conqueror was he speaking? Was it of ViteUius? 
The Romans alone could effect such an extermmation. Com- 
plaints arose: 

"Enough! enough! let him finish!" 

He continued, in a louder voice: 

"Beside their mothers' dead bodies, little children shall 
drag themselves through the dust. You shall go at ni^t 
to seek bread among the ruins, at the risk of sword thrusts. 
The jackals shall fi^t for your bones on the public squares, 
where the old men used to talk at evening. Your virgins, 
swallowing their tears, shall play the lute at the stranger's 
feasts, and your bravest sons shadl bend their backs, crushed 
by too heavy burdens!" 

The people remembered their days of exile, all the calam- 
ities of their history. These were the words of the prophets 
of old. laokanann sent them forth, like mighty blows, one 
after another. 

But the voice became sweet, melodious, musical. It pro- 
claimed enfranchisement, splendid, portents in the sky, the 
newly bom, with an arm in the dragon's cavem, gold in- 
stead of day, the desert blooming like a rose. "That which 
is now worthy sixty talents will not cost an obol. Foimtains 
of milk shall gush from the rocks; you shall sleep m the 
wine-presses, with full bellies! — When wilt Thou come, whose 
coming I await? In anticipation, all the peoples kneel, and 
Thy sway shall be etemal, O Son of David!" 

The Tetrarch threw himself back, the existence of a Son 
of David affronting him like a threat. 

laokanann anathematised him for his assumption of roy- 
alty: — "There is no king save the Etemal!" — and for his 
gardens, his statues, his ivory fumiture — ^like the impious 
Ahab! 

Antipas brok*^ he ^ord "»f t^^ »^«l that hung upon his 



GUSTAVE FLAUBERT 171 

breast, and threw it into jtte hole, bidding Um bold bis 
peace. 

The voice replied: 

''I will cry aloud like the bear, like a wQd asSy like a 
jroman in labour! 

''The punishment has already befallen thee in thy incest 
God afflicts thee with the sterility of the mule." 

And laughter arose, like the plashing t)f the waves. 

Vitellius persisted in remaining. Tlie interpreter, in an 
unmoved voice, repeated in the Roman tongue aU the b- 
vectives that laokanann roared in his own. The Tetnurdi 
and Herodias were forced to listen to them twice. £te 
panted, whQe she, open-mouthed, watched the bottom of the 
hole. 

The ghastly man threw back his head, and, graqdng the 
bars, pressed against them his face, which had the aspect of 
a tangled imderb;iish, and in which two coals of fire beamed. 

"Ah I it is thou, Jezebel! 

"Thou dost take his heart captive with the creaking of 
thy shoes. Thou didst nei^ like a mare. Thou didst set 
thy bed on the mountains, to accomplish thy sacrifices! 

"The Lord shall tear away thine earrings, thy purple 
robes, thy veils of fine linen, the drdets from thine arms, 
the rings from they feet; and the little golden crescents that 
tremble on thy brow, thy silver mirrors, thy fans of ostridi 
feathers, the mother-of-pearl pattens that increase thy sta- 
ture, the pride of thy diamonds, the perfumes of thy hair, 
the painting of thy nails — all the artifices of sensuality; and 
the stones ^all be too few to stone the adulteress!'' 

She glanced about her for protection. The Pharisees 
hypocritically lowered their eyes. The Sadducees turned 
their faces away, fearing to offend the Proconsul. Antipas 
seemed at the point of death. 

The voice grew louder, took on new intonations, rolled 
hither and thither with a crashing as of thunder, and, re- 
peated by the mount£un echoes, struck Machserus with bdt 
after bolt. 

"Stretch thyself in the dust, daughter of Babylon! Grind 
flouri Remove thy girdle, unloose thy shoes, truss up itJf 



172 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

skirts, cross the rivers! Thy shame shall be laid bare, thine 
approbrium shall be seen! thy sobs shall break thy teeth! 
The Eternal abhors the stendi of thy crimes! Accursed! 
accursed! Die like a dog!" 

The trap-door closed, Sie cover was lowered to its place. 
Mannseus wished to strangle laokanann. 

Herodias vanished. The Pharisees were scandalised. An- 
tipas, in their midst, defended himself. 

"Doubtless," said Eleazar, "one may marry his brother's 
wife; but Herodias was not widowed, and, moreover, she had 
a child, wherein lay the abomination." 

"Not so! not so!" objected Jonathas the Sadducee. "The 
Law condemns such marriages, without proscribing than ab- 
solutely." 

"It matters not! They are most unjust to me!" said An- 
tipas; "for Absalom lay with his father's wives, Judah with 
his daughter-in-law, Ammon with his sister. Lot with his 
daughters." 

Aulus, who had been sleeping, reappeared at that mo- 
ment. When he was informed oJF the affair, he took sides 
with the Tetrarch. He should not be disturbed by such 
foolish ideas; and he laughed aloud at the reprobation of the 
priests and the frenzy of laokanann. 

Herodias, on the steps, turned towards him. 

"You are wrong, my master! He bids the people refuse 
to pay the tax." 

"Is that true?" instantly asked the publican. 

The answers were generally in the affirmative. The Te- 
trarch confirmed them. 

Vitellius thought the prisoner might fly; and, as Anti- 
pas's conduct seemed to him equivocal, he posted sentinels 
at the gates, along the walls, and in the courtyard. 

Then he went to his apartment. The deputations of 
priests attended him. 

Each one set forth his grievances, without broaching the 
question of the ofiBce of sacrificer. 

One and all importuned him. He dismissed than. 

Jonathas left him when he saw on the battlements 



GUSTAVE FLAUBERT 175 

ig with a man with long hair and in a white robe— an 
Essene; and he regretted having upheld him. 

One thought afforded the Tetrarch consolation. laoka- 
nann was no longer at his disposal, the Romans had taken 
duurge of him. What a relief! Phanuel was walking on 
the path around the battlements. He adled him and said, 
pointing to the soldiers: 

''They are stronger than I! I cannot set him free; it is 
not my fault!" 

The courtyard was empty. The slaves were at rest. 
Against the reddening sky, flame-coloured on the horizon, 
the smallest perpendicular objects were outlined in black. 
Antipas distinguished the salt-wells at the far end of the 
Dead Sea, and he no longer saw the tents of the Arabs. 
Doubtless they had gone. The moon rose; a feeling of peace 
descended upon his heart. 

Phanuel, overwhelmed, stood with his chin upon his 
breast. At last he made known what he had to say. 

Since the beginning of the month he had studied the sky 
before dawn, the constellation Perseus being at the zenith. 
Agalah was hardly visible, Algol shone less brightly, Mira- 
Coeti had disappeared, whence he augured the death of a 
man of mark, that very night, in Machaerus. 

Who? Vitellius was too well guarded. laokanann would 
not be executed. "Then it is I! " thought the Tetrarch. 
*• Perhaps the Arabs would return. The Proconsul might 
discover his relations with the Parthians! Hired assassins 
from Jerusalem escorted the priests; they had daggers imder 
their garments, and the Tetrarch did not doubt Phanuel's 
learning. 

He conceived the idea of having recourse to Herodias. 
He hated her, however. But she would give him courage, 
and all the bonds were not broken of the spell she had for- 
merly cast upon him. 

Wien he entered her chamber, cinnamon was smoulder- 
ing in a bowl of porphyry; and powders, unguents, fabrics 
like clouds, embroideries lighter than feathers, were scat- 
tered about. 

He did not mention Fhanuel's prediction, or his dread of 



174 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

the Jews and Arabs; she would have accused him of cow- 
ardice. He spoke of the Romans only. Vitellius had con- 
fided to him none of his mOitaiy projects. He supposed him 
to be a friend of Caius, with whom Agrif^ consorted, and 
he would be sent into exile, or perhaps he would, be mur- 
dered. 

Herodias, with indulgent contempt, tried to encourage 
him. At last she took from a small casket a curious medal- 
lion adorned with Tiberius's profile. That was enough to 
make the lictors turn pale and to base accusations upon. 

Antipas, touched with gratitude, asked her how ^e had 
obtained it. 

**It was given me," she replied. 

Beneath a portiere opposite, a bare arm protruded, a 
lovely, youthful arm, that might have been carved in ivory 
by Polycletus. Somewhat awkwardly, and yet with grace, 
it felt about in the air, trying to gra^ a timic left upon a 
stool near the wall. 

An old woman silently passed it to her, pulling aside the 
curtain. 

The Tetrarch remembered the face, but could not place 
it. 

"Is that slave yours?" 

"What matters it to you?" replied Herodias. 

HI 

The guests filled the banquet-hall. 

It had three naves, like a basilica, separated by pfl- 
lars of algum wood, \\iith bronze capitals covered with 
carvings. Two galleries with openwork balustrades over- 
hung it; and a third, in gold filagree, jutted out at one end, 
opposite an immense arc^. 

Candelabra burning on long tables extending the whole 
length cf the hall formed bu^es of fire, between cups of 
painted clay and copper platters, cubes of snow and heaps 
of grapes; but those red gleams one after another were kwt 
in space because of the height of the ceiling, and points of 
light twinkled, like the stars at night, throu^ the biancbes 



GUST A VE FLA UBERT 175 

Through the opening of the vast arch, one could see torches 
on the terraces of the houses; for Antipas feasted his friends, 
his subjects, and all who had presented themselves. 

Slaves, as active as dogs, and with their feet encased in 
sandals of felt, went to and fro, carrying salvers. 

The proconsular table stood upon a platform built of 
sycamore boards, beneath the gilded tribime. Tapestries 
from Babylon enclosed it in a sort of pavilion. 

Three ivory couches, one opposite the door and one on 
either side, held Vitellius, his son, and Antipas; the Pro- 
consul being next the door, at the left, Aulus at the ri^t, 
the Tetrardi in the centre. 

He wore a heavy black cloak, whose texture was invisible 
beneath layers of dye-stuffs; he had paint on his cheek-bones, 
his beard trimmed like a fan, and azure powder on his hair, 
surmounted by a diadem of precious stones. Vitellius re- 
tained his purple baldric, which he wore diagonally over a 
linen timic. Aulus had the sleeves of his robe of violet silk, 
shot with silver, tied at his back. The long spiral curls of 
his hair formed terraces, and a necklace of sapphires sparkled 
on his breast, which was as plump and white as a woman's. 
Beside him, on a mat, with legs crossed, sat a very beautiful 
boy, who smiled incessantly. He had seen him in the kitchen, 
could not live without him, and having difficulty in remem- 
bering his Chaldean name, called him simply the "Asiatic." 
From time to time he stretched himself out on the triclinium. 
Then his bare feet overlooked the assemblage. 

On one side there were the priests and officers of Antipas, 
people from Jerusalem, the chief men of the Greek cities; 
and, imder the Proconsul, Marcellus with the publicans, 
friends of the Tetrarch, the notables of Cana, Ptolemais, and 
Jericho; then, mingled pell-mell, moimtaineers from Libanus 
and Herod's old soldiers (twelve Thradans, a Gaul, two 
Germans), gazelle-hunters, Idumean shepherds, the Sultan of 
Palmyra, seamen of Eziongeber. Each person had before 
him a cake of soft dough, on which to wipe his fingers; and 
their arms, stretching out like vultures' necks, seized olives, 
pistachioes, and almonds. All the faces beamed with joy be- 
neath crowns of flowers. 



176 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

The Pharisees had spumed them as Roman wantcmniaB> 
They shuddered when they were sprinkled with galbumum 
and incense, a compoimd reserved for the use of the Tem- 
ple. 

Aulus nibbed his armpits with it; and Antipas promiaed 
him a Vrhole cargo, with three bales of that genuine balsam 
which caused Cleopatra to covet Palestine. 

A captain of his garrison at Tiberias, recently arrived, 
took his place behind him, to tell him of extraordinary 
events. But his attention was divided between the Pro- 
consul and what was being said at the neighbouring tables. 

The talk was of laokanann and men of his type; SimoD 
of Gittoy purged sin with fire. A certain Jesus 

"The worst of all!" cried Eleazer. "An infamous jug- 
gler!" 

Behind the Tetrarch a man arose, as pale as the hem of 
his chlamys. He descended from the platform and addressed 
the Pharisees: 

"False! Jesus does miracles!" 

Antipas would fain see one. 

"You should have brought Him hither! Tell us." 

Then he told &at he, Jacob, having a dau^ter who was 
sick, had betaken himself to Capernaum, to implore tte 
Master to heal her. The master had replied: "Return to 
thy home, she is healed!" — and he had found har in the 
doorway, having left her bed when the hand of the (Sal 
marked three o'clock, the very moment when he had ac- 
costed Jesus. 

Of course, argued the Pharisees, there are devices, power- 
ful herbs! Sometimes, even there, at Machxrus, one found 
the baaraSy which made men mvulnerable; but to cure with- 
out seeing or touching was an impossibility, unless Jesus 
employed demons. 

And the friends of Antipas, the chief men of Galilee, re- 
peated, shaking their heads: 

"Demons, clearly." 

Jacob, standing between their table and that of the priests, 
held his peace, with a haughty yet gentle bearing. 

They called upon him to speak: — "Explam IBs power." 



GUST A VE FLA UBERT 1 77 

He bent his shoulders, and in an undertone, slowly, as if 
afraid of himself: 

"Know you not that He is the Messiah?" 

All the priests glanced at one another, and Vitellius in- 
quired the meaning of the word. His interpreter waited a 
full minute before replying. 

They called by that name a liberator who should bring 
to them the enjoyment of all their goods and power over all 
peoples. Some indeed maintained that two. should be ex- 
pected. The first would be vanquished by Gog and Magog, 
demons of the North; but the other would exterminate the 
Prince of Evil; and for ages they had expected His coming 
every minute. 

Tlie priests having taken counsel together, Eleazar spoke 
for them. 

First, the Messiah would, be a Son of David, not of a car- 
penter. He would confirm the Law; this Nazarene assailed 
it; and — a yet stronger argument — ^he was to be preceded 
by the coming of Elias. 

Jacob retorted; 

"But Elias has come!" 

"Elias! Elias!" echoed the multitude, even to the farthest 
end of the hall. 

All, in imagination, saw an old man beneath a flock of 
ravens, the lightning shining upon an altar, idolatrous pon- 
tiffs cast into raging torrents; and the women in the trib- 
unes, thought of the widow of Zarephath. 

Jacob wearied himself repeating that he knew him! He 
had seen him! And so had the people! 

"His name?" 

Whereupon he shouted with all his strength: 

"laokanann!" 

Antipas fell backward as if stricken full in the chest. The 
Sadducees leaped upon Jacob. Eleazar harangued, seeking 
to obtain an audience. 

When silence was restored, he folded his doak about him 
and propoimded questions, like a judge. 

"Since the prophet is dead '* 



178 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Murmurs interrupted him. It was believed that Elias had 

disappeared only. 

He angrily rdt)uked the multitude, and asked, ffwitimi^g 
his inquiry: 

''Think you that he has come to life again?'' 

"Why not?" said Jacob. 

The Sadducees shrugged their shoulders; Jonathas, half 
closing his little eyes, forced himself to laugih, like a down. 
Nothing could be more absurd than the claim of the body 
to life everlasting; and he declaimed, for the Proconsul's 
benefit, this line from a contemporary poet: 

Nee crescit, nee post mortem durare videtur. 

But Aulus was leaning over the edge of the tridinium, hb 
forehead bathed in sweat, green of face, his hands on lus 
stomach. 

The Sadducees feigned deep emotion— on the morrow the 
office of sacrificer was restored to them; Antipas made par 
rade of despair; Vitellius remained impassive. None the 
less his suffering was intense; with his son he wotdd lose his 
fortime. 

Aulus had not finished vomiting when he wished to eat 
again. 

'^Give me some marble-dust, schist from Naxos, sea- 
water, no matter what! Suppose I should take a bath?" 

He crunched snow; then, after hesitating between a Com- 
magene stew and pink blackbirds, he decided upon gourds 
with honey. The Asiatic stared at him, that faculty of ab- 
sorbing food denoting a prodigious being of a superior race. 

Bulls' kidneys were served, also dormice, nightingales, 
and minced-meat on vine leaves; and the priests disputed 
concerning the resurrection. Ammonius, pupil of Fhilo the 
Platonist, deemed them stupid, and said as much to Greeks 
who laughed at the oracles. Marcellus and Jacob had come 
together. The first described to the second the bliss he had 
felt during his baptism by Mithra, and Jacob urged him to 
follow Jesus. Wines made from the palm and the tamarisk, 
wines of Safed and of Byblos, flowed from amphorae into 
crateres, from crateres ^^*o drinking-cups, from drinking- 

CUPS Hot *liircti hrnfl^.. Vier* r-^c much talk, and heSltS 



GUST A VE FLA UBERT 1 79 

overflowed. Jacim, althougji a Jew, did not conceal his 
adoration of the planets. A merdiant of Aphaka stupefied 
the nomads by detailing the wonders of the Temple of Hier- 
apolis: and they asked how much the pilgrimage would cost. 
Others climg to their native religion. A German, almost 
blind, sang a hymn in praise of that promontory of Scandi- 
navia where the gods appeared with halos about their faces; 
and men from Sichem refused to eat turtle-doves, from re- 
spect for the dove Azima. 

Many talked, standing in the centre of the hall, and the 
vapour of their breaths, with the smoke of the candles, made 
a fog in the air. Phanuel passed along the wall. He had 
been studying the firmament anew, but he did not approach 
the Tetrarch, dreading the drops of oil, which, to the Es- 
eenes, were a great pollution. 

Blows rang out against the gate of the castle. 

It was known now that laokanann was held a prisoner 
there. Men with torches ascended the path; a black mass 
swarmed in the ravine; and they roared from time to time: 

"laokanann ! laokanann ! " 

"He disturbs everything!" said Jonathas. 

"We shall have no money left if he continues!" added 
the Pharisees. 

And recriminations arose: 

"Protect us!" 

"Let us make an end of him I" 

"You abandon the religion!" 

"Impious as the Herods!" 

"Less so than you!" retorted Antipas. 'It was my father 
who built your temple!" 

Thereupon the Pharisees, the sons of the proscribed, the 
partisans of the Mattathiases, accused the Tetrarch of the 
crimes of his family. 

They had pointed skulls, bristling beards, weak and evil 
hands, or flat noses, great round eyes, and the expression of 
a bulldog. A dozen or more, scribes and servants of the 
priests, fed upon the refuse of holocausts, rushed as far as 
the foot of the platform, and with knives threatened Anti- 
pas, who harangued them, while the Sadducees listlessly 



i8o THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

1 

defended him. He spied Mannaens and motioned him to go, 
Vitellius signifying by his expression that these things did 
not concern him. 

The Pharisees, remaining on their tridinia, worked them- 
selves into a demoniacal frenzy. They broke the dishes 
before them. They had been served with the favourite stew 
of Maecenas — wild ass — imclean meat. 

Aulus mocked at them on the subject of the ass's head, 
which they held in honour, it was said, and indulged in 
other sarcasms concerning their antipathy for pork. Doubt- 
less it was because that vulgar beast had killed their Bac- 
chus; and they were too fond of wine, since a golden vine 
had been discovered in the Temple. 

The priests did not imderstand his words. Fhineas, by 
birth a Galila^an, refused to translate them. Thereupon 
Aulus^s wrath knew no bounds, the more as the Asiatic, 
seized with fright, has disappeared; and the repast faOed 
to please him, the dishes being commonplace, not sufBdently 
disguised! He became calmer when he saw tails of S3rrian 
sheep, which are bundles of fat. 

The character of the Jews seemed hideous to Vitellius. 
Their god might well be Moloch, whose altars he had no- 
ticed along the road; and the sacrifices of children recurred 
to his mind, with the story of the man whom they were mys- 
teriously fattening. His Latin heart rose in disgust at their 
intolerance, their iconoclastic frenzy, their brutish stagna- 
tion. The Proconsul wished to go, Aulus refused. 

His robe fallen to his hips, he lay behmd a heap of food, 
too replete to take more, but persisting in not leaving it. 

The excitement of the people increased. They abandoned 
themselves to schemes of independence. They recalled the 
glory of Israel. All the conquerors had been punished: 
Antigonus, Crassus, Varus. 

"Villains!" exclaimed the Proconsul; for he understood 
Syriac; his interpreter simply gave him time to compose his 
replies. 

Antipas quickly drew the medallion of the Emperor, and, 
watching him tremblingly, held it with the image towards 
him. 



GUSTAVE FLAUBERT i8i 

Suddenly the panels of the golden tribune q)enedy and in 
the brilliant blaze of candles, between her daves and fes- 
toons of anemone, Herodias appeared — on her head an As- 
syrian mitre held in place on her brow by a chin-piece; her 
hair fell in spiral curls over a scarlet peplum, slit along the 
sleeves. With two stone monsters, like those that guards 
the treasure of the Atrides, standing against the door, she 
resembled Cybele flanked by her lions; and from the balus- 
trade above Antipas, she cried, patera in hand: 

"Long life to Caesar!" 

This homage was echoed by Vitellius, Antipas, and the 
priests. 

But there came to them from the lower end of the haU a 
hum of surprise and admiration. A yoimg girl had entered. 

Beneath a bluish veil that concealed her breast and her 
head could be seen her arched eyebrows, the sards at her 
ears, the whiteness of her skin. A square of variegated silk 
covered her shoulders and was secured about her hips by a 
golden girdle. Her black drawers were embroidered with 
mandrakes, and she tapped the floor indolently with tiny 
slippers of humming-birds' feathers. 

When she reached the platform, she removed her veil. 
It was Herodias, as she was in her youth. Then she began 
to dance. 

Her feet passed, one before the other, to the music of a 
flute and a pair of crotala. Her rounded arms seemed to 
beckon some one, who always fled. She pursued him, lighter 
than a butterfly, like an inquisitive Psyche, like a wander- 
ing soul, and seemed on the point of flying away. 

The funereal notes of the gingras succeeded the crotala. 
Prostration had followed hope. Her attitudes signified sighs, 
and her whole person a languor so intense that one knew 
not whether she was weeping for a god or dying of joy in his 
embrace. Her eyes half closed, she writhed and swayed with 
billowy imdulations of the stomach; her bosoms quivered, 
her face remained imnassive, and her feet did not stop. 

Vitellius comn?rf^r^ her to Mnester the pantomimist. Aulus 
was vomiting again. The Tetrarch lost himself in a dream 
and thought no more of Herodias. He fancied that he saw 



i82 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

her near the Sadducees. Then the vi^on faded away. 

It was not a vision. She had sent messengers, far from 
Machaems, to Salome her daughter, whom the Tetrarch loved; 
and it was an excellent scheme. She was sure of him now! 

'rhen it was the frenzy of love that demanded to be satis- 
fied. She danced like the priestesses of the Indies, like the 
Nubian girls of the Cataracts, like the Bacchantes of Lydia. 
She threw herself in all directions, like a flower beaten by 
the storm. The jewels in her ears leaped about, the si& 
on her back shone with a changing gleam; from her arms, 
from her feet, from her garments invisible sparks flashed 
and set men aflame. A harp sang; the multitude replied 
wiiji loud applause. By stretching her legs apart, without 
bending her knees, she stooped so low that her chin touched 
the floor; and the nomads, accustomed to abstinence, the 
Roman soldiers, experts in debauchery, the miserly pnibli- 
cans, the old priests soured by disputes, all, distending their 
nostrils, quivered with desire. 

Then she danced about Antipas's table, in a frenzy of ex- 
citement, like a witch's rhombus; and in a voice broken by 
sobs of lust he said: "Come! comel" She danced on; the 
dulcimers rang out as if they would burst; the crowd roared 
But the Tetrarch shouted louder than them all: ^'Cornel 
come! thou shalt have Capernaum! the plain of Tiberias! 
my citadels! half of my kingdom!" 

She threw herself on her hands, heels in the air, and thus 
circled the platform like a huge scarab, then stopped ab- 
ruptly. 

Her neck and her vertebrae were at right angles.\ The 
coloured skirts that enveloped her legs, falling over her shoul- 
ders like a rainbow, framed her face a cubit from the floor. 
Her lips were painted, her eyebrows intensely black, her eyes 
almost terrible, and drops of sweat on her forehead re- 
sembled steam on white marble. 

She did not speak. They gazed at each other. 

There was a snapping of fingers in the tribune. She went 
thither, reappeared, and, lisping a littie, uttered these words 
with an infantine air: 

"I want you to give me, on a charger, the head " She 



GUSTAVE FLAUBERT i»3 

had forgotten the name, but she continued with a snile: 
"The head of laokanannl" 

The Tetrarch sank back, ovenriiehned. 

He was bound by his word, and the people were waiting. 
But the death that had been predicted to Urn, should it be- 
fall another, might avert his own. If laokanann were really 
Elias, he could escape it; if he were not, the murder would 
'be of no importance. 

Mannaeus was at his side and understood his purpose. 

Vitellius recalled him to give him the countersign of the 
sentinels guarding the moat. 

It was a relief. In a moment all would be over. 

But Mannaeus was hardly prompt in the execution of 
his functions. 

He reappeared, but greatly perturbed. 

For forty years he had filled the post of executions. He 
it was who had drowned Aristobulus, strangled Alexander, 
biumed Mattathias alive, beheaded Zosimus, Pi^qms, Jose- 
phus and Antipates, and he dared not kill laokanannl EBs 
teedi chattered, bis whole body trembled. 

He had seen in front of the hole the Great Angd of the 
Samaritans, all covered with eyes, and brand^hing an 
enormous sword, red and jagged like a flame. Two soldiers 
brought forward as witnesses cotdd confirm him. 

They had seen nothing save a Jewish captain, who had 
rushed upon them and who had ceased to live. 

The frantic rage of Herodias burst forth in a torrent of 
vulgar and murderous abuse. She broke her nails on the 
gilded grating of the tribime, and the two carved lions seemed 
to bite at her shoulders and to roar with her. 

Antipas imitated her, so did the priests, the soldiers, the 
Pharisees, all demanding vengeance; and others indignant 
that their pleasure was delayed. 

Mannaeus went forth, hiding his face. 

The guests found the time of waiting even longer than 
before. They were bored. 

Suddenly die sound of footstq)s echoed in the oorridon. 
The suspense became intolerable. 



i84 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Tlie head entered; and Mannseus hdd it by the hair, at 
arm's "length, proud of the s^lanse. 

When hi laid it on a charger, he offered it to Salome. 
She ran lightly up to the tribune; some moments later the 
head w-as brought back by the same old wcmian whom the 
Tetrarch had noticed that morning on the roof of a house, 
and later in Herodias's chamber. 

He recoiled to avoid looking at it. Vitellius cast an in- 
different ?!ance upon it. 

Manna?us vrent down from the platform and exhibited it 
to the Roman captains, then to all those who were eating 
in that part of the hall. 

They examined it. 

The sharp blade of the instrument, cutting downward, 
had touched the jaw. The comers of the mouth were 
dra^vn con\'ul5ively. Blood, alreadj' dotted, studded the 
beard. The closed eyelids were of a leaden hue, like shells; 
and the canclehbra all about shone upon it. 

It reached the priests' table. A Pharisee turned it over 
curiously, and Mannreus, having turned it back again, placed 
it in front of Aulus, who was awakened by it. Through 
their partly open lids the dead eyes and tiie lifeless eyes 
seemed to speak to each other. 

Then Manna^us presented it to Antipas. Tears flowed 
down the Tetrarch 's cheeks. 

The torches were extinguished. The guests took their 
leave, and Antipas alone remained in the hall, his hands 
pressed against his temples, still gazing at the severed head; 
while Phanuel, standing in the centre of the great nave, mut- 
tered prayers with outstretched arms. 

At the moment when the sun rose, two men, previously 
despatched by laokanann, returned with the long-awaited 
answer. 

They confided it to Phanuel, who was enraptured by it 

Then he showed them the sorrowful object on the charger, 
amidst the renmants of the feast. One of the men said 
to him: 

''Be comforted! He has gcMie down among the dead to 
announce the Christ's coming!" 



GUST A VE FLA UBERT 185 

The Essene understood now the words: "That He may 
grow great, I must needs shrink/' 

And all three, having taken the head of laokanann, went 
forth in the direction of Galilee. 

As it was very heavy, they carried it each in turn. 

1876 



I 

i 

I 



THE ATTACK ON THE MTTX 

(L'Attaque du Moulin) 
By £MIL£ ZOLA 



IT was high holiday at Father Merlier's mill on that plefls- 
ant summer afternoon. Three tables had beoi brought 
out into the garden and placed end to end in the shadow 
of the great elm, and now they were awaiting the arrival of 
the guests. It was known throughout the length and breadth 
of the land that that day was to witness the betrothal of 
old Merlicr's daughter, Frangois, to Dominique, a young 
man who was said to be not overfond of work, but whom 
never a woman for three leagues of the country around coidd 
look at without sparkling eyes, such a well-favoured yomig 
fellow was he. 

That mill of Father Merlier's was truly a very pteasant 
spot. It was situated right in the heart of Rocreuse, at the 
place where the main road makes a sharp bend. The vfl- 
lage has but a single street, bordered on either side by a row 
of low, whitened cottages, but just there where the road 
curves, there are broad stretches of meadow-land, and huge 
trees, which follow the course of the Morelle, cover the low 
grounds of the valley with a most delicious shade. All Lor- 
raine has no more charming bit of nature to show. To rig^t 
and left dense forests, great monarchs of the wood, centuries 
old, rise from the gentle slopes and fill the horizon with a 
sea of verdure, while away towards the south extends the 
plain, of wondrous fertility and checkered almost to infinity 
with its small enclosures, divided off from one another by 

i86 



SMILE ZOLA 187 

flieir live hedges. But what makes the crownhig g^ory of 
Rocreuse is the coofaiess of this verdurous nook, even in the 
liottest days of July and August The Mordle comes dovm 
from the woods of Gagny, and it would seem as if it sath- 
ored to itself on the way all the delicious freshness of the 
foliage beneath which it glides for many a league; it brings 
down with it the murmuring sounds, the facial, solemn 
shadows of the forest. tAnd that is not the only source of 
coolness; there are running waters of all kinds singing among 
Ae copses; one cannot take a step without coming on a 
gushing springy and as she makes his way along the narrow 
paths he seems to be treading above subterranean lakes 
that seek the air and sunshine through the moss above and 
profit by every smallest crevice, at the roots of trees or 
among the chinks and crannies of the rocks, to burst forth 
in fountains of crystalline clearness. So numerous and so 
loud are the whispering voices of these streams that they 
silence the song of the bullfinches. It is as if one were in 
an enchanted park, with cascades falling on every side. 

The meadows below are never athirst. The ^ladows be- 
neath the gigantic chestnut trees are of inky blackness, and 
along the edges of the fields long rows of poplar stand like 
walls of rustling foliage. There is a double avenue of huge 
plane trees ascending across the fields towards the anci^it 
castle of Gagny, now gone to rack and ruin. In this region, 
where drought is never known, vegetation of all kinds b 
wonderfully rank; it is like a flower garden down there in 
the low ground between those two wooded bills, a natural 
garden, where the lawns are broad meadows and the giant 
trees represent colossal beds. When the noon-day sun pours 
down his scorching rays the shadows lie blue upon the 
ground, the glowing vegetation slinnbers in the heat, wfaHe 
every now and then a breath of icy coldness passes under the 
foliage. 

Such was the spot where Father Merlier's mill enlivened 
with its cheerful clack nature run riot. The bufldmg itself, 
constructed of wood and plaster, looked as if it mi$^t be 
coeval with our planet. Its foundations were iii part wadied 
by the MoreUe. «^i>h ^vr^ i«QmdB hito a <^ear po6L A 



1 88 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

dam, a few feet in height, a£forded siiffident head of waler 
to drive the old wheel, which creaked and groaned as it 
revolved, with the asthmatic wheezing of a faithful servant 
who has grown old in her place. Whoiever Father Mcr- 
lier was advised to change it, he would shake his head and 
say that like as not a young wheel would be lazier and not 
so well acquainted with its duties, and then he would set to 
work and patch up the old one with anything that came 
to hand, old hog^ead-staves, bits of rusty iron, zinc or 
lead. The old wheel only seemed the gayer for it, with its 
odd profile, all plumed and feathered with tufts of moss and 
grass, and when the water poured over it in a alver tide 
its gaunt black skeleton was decked out with a gorgeous 
display of pearls and diamonds. 

That portion of the mill which was bathed by the Mo- 
relle had something of the look of a barbaric arch that bad 
been dropped down there by chance. A good half of the 
structure was built on piles; the water came in under the 
floor, and there were deep holes, famous throughout the 
whole country for the eels and the huge crawfish that were 
to be caught there. Below the fall tibe pool was as dear 
as a mirror, and when it was not clouded by foam from 
the wheel one could see troops of great fish swimming about 
in it with the slow, majestic movements of a squadron. 
There was a broken stairway leadmg down to the stream, 
near a stake to which a boat was fastened, and over the 
wheel was a gallery of wood. Such windows as there were 
were arranged without any attempt at order. The whole 
was a quaint conglomeration of nooks and comers, bits of 
wall, additions made here and there as afterthoughts, beams 
and roofs, that gave the mill the aspect of an old disman- 
tled citadel; but ivy and all sorts of creeping plants had 
grown luxuriantly and kindly covered up sudi crevices 
as were too unsightly, casting a mantle of green over the 
old dwelling. Young ladies who passed that way used to 
stop and sketch Father Merlier's mill in their albums. 

The side of the house that faced the road was less iiTQg- 
ular. A gateway in stone afforded access to the princ^ 
courtyard, on the right and left hand of ^Aich woe diedi 



6MILE ZOLA 189 

and stables. Beside a well stood an immense elm that 
&rew its shade over half the court. At the further end, 
opposite the gate, stood the house surmounted by a dovecote, 
the four windows of its first floor in a symmetrical line. 
The only vanity that Father Merlier ever allowed himself 
was to paint this faqade every ten years. It had just been 
freshly whitened at the time of our story, and dazzled the 
eyes of all the village when the sun lighted it up in the 
middle of the day. 

For twenty years had Father Merlier been mayor of 
Rocreuse. He was held in great consideration on account 
of his fortune; he was supposed to be worth something like 
eighty thousand francs, the result of patient saving. When 
he married Madeleine Guillard, who brought him the mill 
as her dowry, his entire capital lay in his two strong arms, 
but Madeleine had never repented of her choice, so manfully 
had he conducted their joint affairs. Now his wife was 
dead, and he was left a widower with his daughter Fran- 
<;oise. Doubtless he might have set himself down to take 
his rest, and suffered the old mill-wheel to sleep among its 
moss, but he would have found idleness too irksome and 
the house would have seemed dead to him. He kept on 
working still for the pleasure of it. In those days Father 
Merlier was a tall old man, with a long, silent face, on 
which a laugh was never seen, but beneath which there lay, 
none the less, a large fund of good-humour. He had been 
dected mayor on account of his money, and also for the 
impressive air that he knew how to assume when it devolved 
on him to marry a couple. 

Franqoise Merlier had just completed her eighteenth year. 
She was small, and for tiiat reason was not account'^d one 
of the beauties of the country. Until she reached the age 
of fifteen she had been even homely: the good folVs of 
Rocreuse could not see how it was that the daughter of 
Father and Mother Merlier, such a hale, vigorous counlc, 
had such a hard time of it in eettin?' her growth. When 
she was fifteen, hnwpver. fhmi<Th ^f\\\ r^Tn^\n\r\a del^rat^. 
a chancre came over her and she took on the prettiest little 
face imaginable. She had black hair, black eyes, and was 



IQO THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

red as a rose withal; her mouth was always smiUng, tbere 
were delicious dimples in her cheeks, and a crown of sun- 
shine seemed to be ever resting on her fair, candid fore- 
head. Although small as girls went in that r^ion, she was 
far from being thin; she mi^t not have been aUe to 
raise a sack of wheat to her shoulder, but she became qmte 
plump as she grew older, and gave promise of becoming 
eventually as well-rounded and appetising as a paitEi4gs^ 
Her father's habits of taciturnity had made her re&ctive 
while yet a young girl; if she always had a smile on her 
lips it was in order to give pleasure to others. Her naliDal 
disposition was serious. 

As was no more than to be expected, she had every yoaog 
man in the countryside at her heels as a suitor, more even for 
her money than her attractiveness, and she had made a 
choice at last, a choice that had beai the talk and scandil 
of the entire neighbourhood. 

On the other side of the Morelle lived a strapping yoaog 
fellow who went by the name of Dominique Penquer. He 
was not to the manner bom; ten years previously he bad 
come to Rocreuse from Belgium to receive the ixdieritanoe 
of an uncle who had owned a small property on the veiy 
borders of the forest of Gagny, just facing the naill and 
distant from it only a few musket-shots. IGs object in 
coming was to sell the property, so he said, and return to 
his own home again; but he must have found the land to 
his liking, for he made no move to go away. He was seen 
cultivating his bit of a field and gathering the few vege- 
tables that afforded him an existence. He fished, he 
hunted; more than once he was near coming in contact with 
the law through the intervention of the keepers. This inde- 
pendent way of living, of which the peasants could not 
very clearly see the resources, had in the end ^ven him a 
bad name. He was vaguely looked on as nothing brtter 
than a poacher. At all events he was lazy, for he was fre- 
quently found sleeping in the grass at hours when he ahoidd 
have been at work. Then, too, the hut in which he Hved, in 
the shade of the last trees of the forest, did not seem Uke 
the abode of an honest young man; the old wonen would 



6MILE ZOLA 191 

not have been surprised at any time to bear tbat be was 
on friendly terms with the wolves in the ruins of Gagny. 
Still, the young girls would now and then venture to stand 
up for him, for he was altogether a splendid spedmen of 
manhood, was this individual of doubtful antecedents^ taU 
and strai^t as a yoimg poplar, with a milk-white skin and 
ruddy hair and moustaches that seemed to be of gold when 
the sun shone on them. Now one fine morning it came 
to pass that Frangoise told Father Merlier that she loved 
Dominique, and that never, never would she consent to 
marry any other young man. 

It may be imagined what a knockdown blow it was that 
Father Merlier received that day! As was his wont, he 
said never a word; his countenance wore its usual reflective 
look, only the fim that used to bubble up from within no 
longer shone in his eyes. Fraagoise, too, was very serious, 
and for a week father and dau^ter scarcely spoke to each 
other. What troubled Father Merlier was to know how that 
rascal of a poacher had succeeded in bewitching his dau^- 
ter. Dominique had never shown himself at the mill, llie 
miller played the spy a little, and was rewarded by catch- 
ing si^t of the gallant, on the other side of the Morelle, 
lying among the grass and pretending to be asleep. Fran- 
qoise could see him from her chamber window. The thing 
was clear enough; they had been making sheep's-eyes at 
each other over the old mill-wheel, and so had fallen m 
love. 

A week slipped by; Franqoise became more and more 
serious. Father Merlier still continued to say nothing. 
Then, one evening, of his own accord, he brought Dominique 
to the house, without a word. Franqoise was just setting 
the table. She made no demonstration of surprise; all she 
did was to add another plate, but her laugh had come back 
to her, and the little dimples appeared auain unon her 
cheeks. Father Merlier had erone that morning to look 
for Dominique at his hut on the edge of the forest, and 
there the two men had had a conference, with closed doors 
and windows, that lasted three hours. No one ever knew 
ifb^i they said to each other; &e only thing certain is that 



192 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

when Father Merlier left the but he akeady treated Domin- 
ique as a son. Doubtless the old man had discovered that 
he whom he had gone to visit was a worthy young fellow, 
even though he did lie in the grass to gain the love of young 
girls. 

All Rocreuse was up in arms. The women gathered at 
their doors and could not find words strong raoug^ to char- 
acterise Father Merlier's folly in thus receiving a ne'er-do- 
well into his family. He let them talk. Perhaps be thou^t 
of his own marriage. Neither had he possessed a penny to 
his name at the time he married Madeleine and her mill, 
and yet that had not prevented him from being a good 
husband to her. Moreover, Dominique put an end to their 
tittle-tattle by setting to work in such strumous fashion 
that all the countryside was amazed. It so happened just 
then that the boy of the mill drew an unlucky number and 
had to go for a soldier, and Dominique would not hear 
of their engaging another. He lifted sacks, drove the cait, 
wrestled with the old wheel when it took an obstinate fit 
and refused to turn, and all so pluckily and cheerfuUy that 
people came from far and near merely for the pleasure of 
seeing him. Father Merlier laughed his silent laug^. He 
was highly elated that he had read the youngster aright 
There is nothing like love to hearten up young men. 

In the midst of all that laborious toil Frangoise and Dom- 
inique fairly worshipped each other. They had not much 
to say, but their tender smiles conveyed a world of mean- 
ing. Father Merlier had not said a word thus far on the 
subject of their marriage, and they had both respected his 
silence, waiting until the old man should see fit to give 
expression to his will. At last, one day, toward the middle 
of July, he had had three tables laid in the courtyard, in the 
shade of the big elm, and had mvited his fri^ds of Ro- 
creuse to come that afternoon and drink a glass of wine 
with him. When the courtyard was filled with people, and 
every one there had a full glass in his hand. Father Meriier 
raised his own high above his head and said: 

'1 have the pleasure of announcing to you that Fran^obe 



6MILE ZOLA 193 

and this lad will be married in a month from now, on St. 
Louis' fete-day." 

Then there was a universal touching of glasses, attended 
by a tremendous uproar; every one was laughing. But 
Father Merlier, raising his voice above the din, again ^x)ke: 

''Dominique, kiss your wife that is to be. It is no more 
than customary." 

And they kissed, very red in the face, both of them, while 
the company lauded louder still. It was a regular fete; 
they emptied a small cask. Then, when only the intimate 
friends of the house remained, conversation went on in a 
calmer strain. Night had fallen, a starlit night, and very 
clear. Dominique and Frangoise sat on a bendi, side by 
side, and said nothing. An old peasant spoke of the war 
that the Emperor had declared against Prussia. All the 
lads of the village were already gone off to the army. 
Troops had passed through the place only the night before. 
There were going to be hard knocks. 

"Bah!" said Father Merlier, with the selfishness of a 
man who is quite happy, "Dominique is a foreigner; he 
won't have to go — and if the Prussians come this way, he 
will be here to defend his wife." 

The idea of the Prussians coming there seemed to the 
company an exceedingly good joke. The army would give 
them one good conscientious thrashing, and the affair would 
be quickly ended. 

"I have seen them before, I have seen them before," the 
old peasant repeated, in a low voice. 

There was silence for a little, then they all touched glasses 
once again. Frangoise and Dommique had heard nothing; 
they had managed to clasp hands behind the bench in sudi 
a way as not to be seen by the others, and this condition 
of affairs seemed so beatific to them that they sat there 
mute, their gaze lost in the darkness of the night. 

What a map;nificent, balmy night! The village lav slum- 
bering on either side of the white road as peacefully as a 
little child. The deep silence was undisturbed save by 
the occasional crow of a cock in some distant barnyard act- 
ing on a mistaken impression that dawn was at hand. Per- 



S94 THE GREAT MODERW FBBXCH STOtOBS 




famod breatbs of air, Iik£ long-dnnni 

flie great woods that lay aromd and above, 

aver the roofs, as if caressixig tixm. The 

their black inteositT of diadow, took en a 

majesty of thdr own, while aB tiie spna^ all die bnoks 

and wateroonFses that gurgled in tiie daiknes^ ""^fl^* liave 

been taken for the ood and xhythnncal bre alMqg of tte 

deeping conntry. Every now and then the old doaqg nill- 

wfaed seemed to be dreanung like a watch-dqg Aat haAs 

tmeasOy in his slmnber; it crnked, it taDoBd to had^ locked 

by the fall of the Mofde, whoae cnncnt gave fnA the 

deep, sustained moac of an organ-pqie. Never woa Acre 

a more channing or h^jpier nocd^ never did a deqicr peace 

come down to cover it 

n 

One month later, to a day, on the eve of Ae file of 
Saint Louis, Rocreuse was in a state of alarm and fismay. 
The Prussians had beaten the Enqxror, and were advanc- 
ing on the Nlllage by forced marches. For a week past 
people passing along the road had broo^t ticfings of the 
enemy: "They are at Lormieres, they are at Noavdks;'' 
and by dint of hearing so many stories of the rajmSty of 
thdr advance, Rocreuse woke up every morning in the fidl 
expectation of seeing them swarming down out of Gagoy 
wood. They did not come, however, and that only served 
to make the affright the greater. They would certidnly bSH 
upon the village in the nig^t-time, and put every aoal to 
the sword. 

There had been an alarm the night before, a little before 
daybreak. The inhabitants had beai aroused by a great 
noise of men tramping upon the road. The women were 
already throwing themselves upon thdr knees and maUng 
the sign of the cross, when some one, to whom it h^ipfly 
occurred to peep through a half-opened window, caiqi^ 
sight of red trousers. It was a French detachment Hie 
captain had forthwith asked for the ma3ror, and, after a 
long conversation with Father MerUer, had remained at the 
mill. 



6MILE ZOLA 195 

The sun shone bri^t and dear that monungi giving pram* 
iae of a warm day. There was a golden lij^t floating over 
the woodland, while in the low grounds white mists were 
rising from the meadows. The pretty vOlage, so neat and 
trim, awoke in the cool dawning, and the comitry, with its 
streams and its fomitains, was as gracious as a freshly 
plucked bouquet But the beauty of the day brought j^ad* 
ness to the face of no one; the villagers had watched the 
captain, and seen him drde round and round the old mill, 
examine the adjacent houses, then pass to the other bank 
of the Morelle, and from thence scan the country with a 
field-glass; Father Merlier, who accompanied him, zp- 
peared to be giving eiqplanations. After that the captain 
had posted some of his men bdiind waUs, behind trees, 
or in hollows. The main body of the detachment had 
encamped in the courtyard of the mill. So there was 
going to be a fight, then? And wh^ Father Merlier re- 
turned they questioned him. He qx>ke no word, but slowly 
and sorrowfully nodded his head. Yes, there was going 
to be a fight. 

FranQoise and Dominique were there in the courtyard, 
watching him. He finally took his pipe from his lips and 
gave utterance to these few words: 

"Ah! my poor children, I shall not be able to marry 
you to-day!" 

Dominique, with lips tight set and an angry frown upon 
his forehead, raised himself on tiptoe from time to time and 
stood with eyes bent on Gagny wood, as if he would have 
been glad to see the Prussians appear and end the sus- 
pense they were in. Franqoise, whose face was grave and 
very pale, was constantly passing back and forth, supplying 
the needs of the soldiers. They were preparing their soup 
in a comer of the courtyard, joking and chaffing one an- 
other while awaiting their meal. 

The captain appeared to be highly pleased. He had 
visited the chambers and the great hall of the mill that 
looked out on the stream. Now, seated beside the well he 
was conversing with Father Merlier. 

"You have a regular fortress here," he was saying 



196 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"We shall have no trouble in holding it until evening. 
The bandits are late; they ought to be here by this time." 

The miller looked very grave. He saw his beloved mill 
going up in flame and smoke, but uttered no word 
of remonstrance or complaint, considering that it would 
be useless. He only opened his mouth to say: 

"You ought to take steps to hide the boat; there is a 
hole behind the wheel fitted to hold it. Perhaps you may 
find it of use to you." 

The captain gave an order to one of his men. This 
captain was a tall, fine-looking man of about forty, with 
an agreeable expression of countenance. The sight of Dom- 
inique and Frangoise seemed to afford him much pleasure; 
he watched them as if he had forgotten all about the ap- 
proaching conflict. He followed Franqoise with his eyes 
as she moved about the courtyard, and his manner showed 
clearly enough that he thought her charming. Then, turn- 
ing to Dominique: 

"You are not with the army, I see, my boy?" he abruptly 
asked. 

"I am a foreigner," the yoimg man replied. 

The captain did not seem particularly pleased with the 
answer; he winked his eyes and smiled. Franqoise was 
doubtless a more agreeable companion than a musket would 
have been. Dominique, noticing his smile, made haste to 
add: 

"I am a foreigner, but I can lodge a rifle bullet in an 
apple at five hundred yards. See, fliere's my rifle behind 
you." 

"You may find use for it," the captain drily answered. 

Franqoise had drawn near; she was trembling a little, 
and Dominique, regardless of the bystanders, took and 
held firmly clasped in his own the two hands that she held 
forth to him, as if committing herself to his protection. The 
captain smiled again, but said nothing more. He remained 
seated, his sword between his legs, his eyes fixed on space, 
apparently lost in dreamy reverie. 

It was ten o'clock. The heat was already oppressive. 
A deep silence prevail**'! Th#* soldiers had sat down in 



6MILE ZOLA 197 

the shade of the sheds in the courtyard and begun to eat 
their soup. Not a sound came from the village, where the 
inhabitants had all barricaded their houses, doors and win- 
dows. A dog, abandoned by his master, howled mourn- 
fully upon the road. From the woods and the near-by 
meadows, that lay fainting in the heat, came a long-drawn, 
whispering, soughing sound, produced by the imion of what 
wandering breaths of air there were. A cuckoo called. 
Then the silence became deeper still. 

And all at once, upon that lazy, sleepy air, a shot rang 
out. The captain rose quickly to his feet, the soldiers left 
their half-emptied plates. In a few seconds all were at 
their posts; the mill was occupied from top to bottom. 
And yet the captain, who had gone out through the gate, 
saw nothing; to right and left the road stretched away, 
desolate and blindingly white in the fierce sunshine. A 
second report was heard, and still nothing to be seen, not 
even so much as a shadow; but just as he was tiuning 
to re-enter he chanced to look over toward Gagny and 
there beheld a little puff of smoke floating away on the 
tranquil air, like thistledown. The deep peace of the forest 
was apparently unbroken. 

"The rascals have occupied the wood," the officer mur- 
mured. "They know we are here." 

Then the firing went on, and became more and more 
continuous between the French soldiers posted about the 
mill and the Prussians concealed among the trees. The 
bullets whistled over the Morelle without domg any mis- 
chief on either side. The firing was irregular; every bush 
seemed to have its marksman, and nothing was to be seen 
save those bluish smoke wreaths that hung for a moment 
on the wind before they vanished. It lasted thus for 
nearly two hours. The officer hummed a tune with a care- 
less air. Frangoise and Dominique, who had remained in 
the courtyard, raised themselves to look out over a low 
wall. They were more particularly interested in a little 
soldier who had his post on the bank of the Morelle, behind 
the hull of an old boat; he would lie face downward on 
the ground, watch his chance, deliver his fire, thra slip back 



198 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

into a ditch a few steps in his rear to reload, and his move- 
ments were so comical, he di^layed such cunning and 
activity, that it was difficult for any one watching bim 
to refrain from smilmg. He must have caught si^t of a 
Prussian, for he rose quickly and brought his piece to the 
shoulder, but before he could discharge it he uttered a loud 
cry, whirled completely around in his tracks and fell back* 
ward into the ditch, where for an instant his legs moved 
convulsively, just as the claws of a fowl do when it is 
beheaded. The little soldier had received a bullet directly 
through his heart. It was the first casualty of the day. 
FranQoise instinctively seized Dominique's hand, and bdd 
it ti^t in a convulsive grasp. 

"Come away from there," said the captain. "The bul- 
lets reach us here." 

As if to confirm his words a slight, sharp sound was heard 
up in the old elm, and the end of a branch came to the 
ground, turning over and over as it fell, but the two young 
p)eople never stirred, riveted to the spot as they were by 
the interest of the spectacle. On the edge of the wood 
a Prussian had suddenly emerged from bdiind a tree, as 
an actor comes upon the stage from the wings, beating the 
air with his arms and falling over upon hiis back. And 
beyond that there was no movement; the two dead men 
appeared to be sleeping in the bri^t sunshine; there was 
not a soul to be seen in the fields on which the heat lay 
heavy. Even the sharp rattle of the musketry had ceased. 
Only the Morelle kept on whispermg to itself with its low, 
musical murmur. 

Father Merlier looked at the captain with an astonished 
air, as if to inquire whether that were the end of it 

"Here comes their attack," the officer murmured. "Look 
out for yourself! Don't stand there!" 

The words were scarcely out of his mouth when a terri- 
ble discharge of musketry ensued. The great elm was 
riddled, its leaves came eddying down as thick as snow- 
flakes. Fortimately, the Prussians had aimed too hig^. 
Dominique dragged, almost carried, Frangoise from the 
spot, while Father Merlier followed them, slKmting: 



nUILE ZOLA X99 

''Get into the anall cdlar, the walls are thicker ttiere." 

But they paid no attention to him; they made their way 
to the main hall, where ten or a dozen scddiers were aOenily 
waiting, watching events outside throu^ the chinks of ikm 
dosed shutters. The captain was left alone in the court* 
yard, where he Adtered hhnself behind the low wall, while 
the furious fire was maintained uninterruptedly. The sol* 
diers whom he had posted outside only yidded their ground 
inch by inch; they came crawlmg in, however, one after 
another, as the enemy^ dislodged them from thdr positiooB. 
Thdr instructions were to gain all the time they ooidd, 
taking care not to show themsdves, in order that the Fhu- 
sians mig^t remain in ignorance of the force th^ had op^ 
posed to them. Another hour passed, and as a sergeant 
came in, reporting that there were now only two or tluee 
men left outside, the officer took his watch from his pock- 
et, murmuring: 

'^Half-past two. Come, we must hold out for four hours 
yet." 

He caused the great gate of the courtyard to be tightly 
secured, and everything was made ready for an energetic 
defence. The Prussians were on the ofher side of the 
Mordle, consequently there was no reason to fear an as- 
sault at the moment. There was a bridge indeed, a mfle 
and a quarter away, but they were iMX)biEd)ly unaware of 
its existence, and it was harcUy to be supposed that they 
would attempt to cross the stream by fording. The officer, 
therefore, simply caused the road to be watched; the at- 
tack, when it came, was to be looked for from die direc- 
tion of the fidds. 

The firing had ceased agam. The mill ^^)eared to lie 
there in the sunlight, void of all life. Not a shutter was 
open, not a sound came from within. Gradually, how- 
ever, the Prussians began to show themsdves at tibe edge 
of Gagny wood. Heads were protruded here and there; 
they seemed to be mustering xxp their courage. Several of 
the soldiers within the mill brought up thdr i^eces to an 
aim, but the captain shouted: 

''No, no; not yet; wait Let fliem ccHne nearer.** 



200 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

They displayed a great deal of pradence in their ad- 
vance, looking at the mill with a distrustful air; they 
seemed hardly to know what to make of the old structure, 
so lifeless and gloomy, with its curtain of ivy. Still they 
kept on advancing. When there were fifty of them or 
so in the open, directly op^site, the officer uttered one 
word: 

"Now!" 

A crashing, tearing discharge burst from the position, 
succeeded by an irregular, dropping fire. Franqoise, trem- 
bling violently, involimtarily raised her hands to her ears. 
Dominique, from his position behind the soldiers, peered 
out upon the field, and when the smoke drifted away a 
little, counted three Prussians extended on their backs in 
the middle of the meadow. The others had sought shelter 
among the willows and the poplars. And then commenced 
the siege. 

For more than an hour the mill was riddled with bullets; 
they beat and rattled on its old walls like hail. The noise 
they made was plainly audible as they struck the stone- 
work, were flattened, and fell back into the water; they 
buried themselves in the woodwork with a diill thud. Occa- 
sionally a creaking sound would announce that the whed 
had been hit. Within the building the soldiers husbanded 
their ammunition, firing only when they could see some- 
thing to aim at. The captain kept consulting his watch 
every few minutes, and as a ball split one of the shutters 
in halves and then lodged in the ceiling: 

"Four o'clock," he murmiwed. "We shall never be able 
to hold the position.' ^ 

The old mill, in truth, was gradually going to {deoet be- 
neath that terrific fire. A shutter that had been perforated 
again and again, until it looked like a piece of lace, feD 
off its hinges into the water, and had to be replaced by a 
mattress. Every moment, almost. Father Merlier expositd 
himself to the fire in order to take account of the damage 
sustained by his poor wheel, every wound of which was like 
a bullet in his own heart. Its period of usefulness was 
ended this time for certain; he would never be able to patch 



&MILE ZOLA 201 

it up again. Dominique had besought Franqoise to retire to 
a place of safety, but she was determined to remain with 
him; she had taken a seat behind a great oaken clothes- 
press, which afforded her protection. A ball struck the 
press, however, the sides of which gave out a dull hollow 
soimd, whereupon Dominique stationed himself in front of 
Frangoise. He had as yet taken no part in the firing, 
although he had his rifle in his hand; the soldiers occupied 
the whole breadth of the windows, so that he could not 
get near them. At every discharge the floor trembled. 

"Look out! look out!" the captain suddenly shouted. 

He had just descried a dark mass emerging from the 
wood. As soon as they gained the open fiiey set up a 
telling platoon fire. It struck the mill like a tornado. An- 
other shutter parted company, and the bullets came whis- 
tling in through the yawning aperture. Two soldiers rolled 
upon the floor; one lay where he fell and never moved a 
limb; his comrades pushed him up against the wall because 
he was in their way. The other writhed and twisted, be- 
seeching someone to end his agony, but no one had ears 
for the poor wretch; the bullets were still pouring in, and 
every one was looking out for himself and searching for a 
loophole whence he might answer the enemy's fire. A third 
soldier was wounded; that one said not a word, but with 
staring, haggard eyes sank down beneath a table. Fran- 
goise, horror-stricken by the dreadful spectacle of the dead 
and dying men, mechanically pushed away her chair and 
seated herself on the floor, against the wall; it seemed 
to her that she would be smaller there and less exposed. In 
the meantime men had gone and secured all the mattresses 
in the house; the opening of the window was partiayy 
closed again. The hall was filled with debris of every 
description, broken weapons, dislocated furniture. 

"Five o'clock," said the captain. "Stand fast, boys. 
They are going to make an attempt to pass the stream." 

Just then Franqoise gave a shriek. A bullet had struck 
the floor, and, rebounding, grazed her forehead on the ri- 
cochet. A few drops of blood appeared. Dominique 
looked at her, then went to the window and fired his fiirst 



202 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

shot, and from that time kept on firing uninterruptedly. He 
kept on loading and disdiarging his piece mechanically, 
paying no attention to what was passing at his side, only 
pausing from time to time to cast a look at Fran^oise. He 
did not fire hurriedly or at random, moreover, but took de- 
liberate aim. As the captain had predicted, the Prussians 
were skirting the belt of poplars and attempting the pas- 
sage of the Morelle, but each time that one of them showed 
himself he fell with one of Dominique's bullets in his brain. 
The captain, who was watching the performance, was 
amazed; he complimented the young man, telling him that 
he would like to have many more mark^en of his skill. 
Dominique did not hear a word he said. A ball struck him 
in the shoulder, another raised a contusion on his arm. And 
still he kept on firing. 

There were two more deaths. The mattresses were torn 
to shreds and no longer availeid to stop the windows. The 
last volley that was poured in seemed as if it would carry 
away the mill bodily, so fierce it was. The position was 
no longer tenable. Still, the officer kept repeating: 

"Stand fast. Another half-hour yet." 

He was counting the minutes, one by one, now. He had 
promised his commanders that he would hold the enemy 
there imtil nightfall, and he would not budge a hair's-breadtib 
before the moment that he had fixed on for his withdrawal. 
He maintained his pleasant air of good-humour, smiling at 
Frangoise by way of reassuring her. He had picked up 
the musket of one of the dead soldiers and was firing away 
with the rest. 

There were but four soldiers left in the room. The Prus- 
sians were showing themselves en masse on the other side 
of the Morelle, and it was evident that they might now 
pass the stream at any moment. A few moments more 
elapsed; the captain was as determined as ever, and would 
not ^ve the order to retreat, when a sergeant came ninnipg 
into the room, saying: 

"They are on the road; they are going to take us in rear.'' 

The Prussians must have discovert the bridge. The 
captain drew out his watch again. 



BMILE ZOLA 203 

''Five minutes more," he said. "They won't be hoe 
within five minutes." 

Then exactly at six o'clock he at last withdrew his men 
through a litUe postern that opened on a narrow hme, 
whence they threw themselves into the ditch, and in that 
way reached the forest of Sauval. The captain took leave 
of Father Merlier with much politeness, apologidng pro- 
fusely for the trouble he had caused. He even added: 

"Try to keep them occupied for a while. We shaO 
return." 

While this was occurring Dominique had remained alone 
in the hall. He was still firing away, hearing nothing, 
conscious of nothing; his sole thought was to defend Fran« 
Qois. The soldiers were all gone, and he had not the re* 
motest idea of the fact; he aimed and brought down his 
man at every shot. All at once there was a great tumult 
The Prussians had entered the courtyard from the rear. 
He fired his last shot, and they fell upon him with his 
weapon still smoking in his hand. 

It required four men to hold him; the rest of them 
swarmed about him, vociferating like madmen in theu: hor- 
rible dialect. Franqoise rushed forward to intercede with 
her prayers. They were on the point of killing him on the 
spot, but an officer came in and made them turn the pris- 
oner over to him. After exchanging a few words in Ger- 
man with his men he turned to Dominique and said to 
him roughly, in very good French: 

"You will be shot in two hours from now." 

m 

It was the standing regulation, laid down by the German 
staff, that every Frenchman, not belonging to the regular 
army, taken with arms in his hands should be shot. Even 
the compagnies franches were not recognized as belligerents. 
It was the intention of the Germans, in makmg such terrible 
examples of the peasants who attempted to defend their 
firesides, to prevent a rising en masse, wUdi th^ greatly 
dreaded. 



204 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

The officer, a tall, square man about fifty years old^ sub- 
jected Dominique to a brief examination. Althou^ he 
spoke French fluently, he was unmistakably Prussian in 
the stiffness of his manner. 

"You are a native of this country?" 

"No, I am a Belgian." 

"Why did you take up arms? These are matters with 
which you have no concern." 

Dominique made no reply. At this moment the officer 
caught sight of Franqoise where she stood listenmg, very 
pale; her slight wound had marked her white forehead with 
a streak of red. He looked from one to the other of the 
yoimg people and appeared to imderstand the situation: 
he merely added: 

"You do not deny having fired on my men?" 

"I fired as long as I was able to do so," Dominique 
quietly replied. 

The admission was scarcely necessary, for he was black 
with powder, wet with sweat, and the blood from the woimd 
in his shoulder had trickled down and stained his clothing. 

"Very well," the officer repeated. "You wiU be shot two 
hours hence." 

Franqoise uttered no cry. She clasped her hands and 
raised tliem above her head in a gesture of mute despair. 
Her action was not lost upon the officer. Two soldiers had 
led Dominique away to an adjacent room, where thdr 
orders were to guard him and not lose sight of him. The 
girl had simk upon a chair; her strength had failed her, 
her legs refused to support her; she was denied the relief 
*of tears, it seemed as if her emotion was strangling her. 
The officer continued to examme her attentively, and finally 
addressed her: 

"Is that yoimg man your brother?" he inquired. 

She shook her head in negation. He was as rigid and 
unbending as ever, without the suspicion of a smQe on 
his face. Then, after an interval of silence, he spoke again: 

"Has he been living in the neighbourhood long?" 

She answered yes, by another motion of the head 



SMILE ZOLA 205 

''Then he must be well acquainted with the woods about 
here?" 

This time she made a verbal answer. "Yes, sir/' she 
said, looking at him with some astonishment. 

He said nothing more, but turned on his heel, request- 
ing that the mayor of the village should be brought before 
him. But Franqoise had risen from her chau:, a famt tmge 
of colour on her cheeks, believing that she had caught the 
significance of his questions, and with renewed hope she 
ran off to look for her father. 

As soon as the firing had ceased Father Merller had hur- 
riedly descended by d^e wooden gallery to have a look at 
his wheel. He adored his daughter and had a strong feel- 
ing of affection for Dominique, his son-in-law who was to 
be; but his wheel also occupied a large space in his heart. 
Now that the two little ones, as he called them, had come 
safe and sound out of the fray, he thought of his other love, 
which must have suffered sorely, poor thing, and bending 
over the great wooden skeleton he was scrutinising its woimds 
with a heart-broken air. Five of the buckets were reduced 
to splinters, the central framework was honeycombed. He 
'was thrusting his fingers into the cavities that the bullets 
had made to see how deep they were and reflecting how 
he was ever to repair all that damage. When Franqoise 
found him he was already plugging up the crevices with 
moss and such debris as he could lay hands on. 

"They are asking for you, father," said he. 

And at last she wept as she told him what she had just 
heard. Father Merlier shook his head. It was not cus- 
tomary to shoot people like that. He would have to look 
into the matter. And he re-entered the miU with his usual 
placid, silent air. When the officer made his demand for 
supplies for his men, he answered that the people of Ro- 
creuse were not accustomed to be ridden roughshod, and 
that nothing would be obtained from them through violence; 
he was willing to assume all the reqx)nsibility, but only on 
condition that he was allowed to act independently. The 
officer at first £^peared to take tmbrage at this easy way 
of viewing matt^ but finally gave way before the old 



206 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

man's brief and distinct r^resentations. As the latter was 
leaving the room the other recalled him to ask: 

"Those woods there, opposite, what do you call tfaem?'' 

"The woods of Sauval." 

"And how far do they extend?" 

The miller looked hi^ straight in the face. "I do not 
know," he replied. 

And he withdrew. An hour later the subvention in 
money and provisions that the officer had demanded was 
in the courtyard of the mill. Night was coming in; Fran- 
Qoise followed every movement of the soldiers with an 
anxious eye. She never once left the vidnity of the room 
in which Dominique was imprisoned. About seven o'dock 
she had a harrowing emotion; she saw the officer enter the 
prisoner's apartment, and for a quarter of an hour heard 
their voices raised in violent discussion. The officer came 
to the door for a moment and gave an order in German 
which she did not understand, but when twelve men came 
and formed in the courtyard with shouldered muskets, she 
was seized with a fit of trembling and felt as if she should 
die. It was all over then; the execution was about to take 
place. The twelve men remained there ten minutes; Dom- 
inique's voice kept rising higher and higher m a tone of 
vehement denial. Finally the officer came out, dosing the 
door behind him with a vicious bang and saying: 

"Very well; think it over. I give you until to-morrow 
morning." 

And he ordered the twelve men to break ranks by a 
motion of his hand. Franqoise was stupefied. Father Mer- 
lier, who had continued to puff away at his pipe whfle. 
watching the platoon with a simple, curious air, came and 
took her by the arm with fatherly gentleness. He led her 
to her chamber. 

"Don't fret," he said to her; "try to get some deep. To- 
morrow it will be light and we shall see more dearly." 

He locked the door behind him as he left the room. It 
was a fixed principle with him that women are good for 
nothing, and that they spoil everything whenever they 
meddle in important matters. Franfoise did not lie down. 



SMILE ZOLA 207 

however; she remamed a long time seated on her bed^ listen- 
ing to the various noises in the house. The Gennan soldiers 
quartered in the court3rard were singing and laughing; they 
must have kept up their eating and drinking until deven 
o'clock, for the riot never cea^ for an instant. Heavy 
footsteps resounded from time to time through the mill 
itself, doubtless the tramp of the guards as they were re- 
lieved. What had most interest for her was tibe sounds 
that she could catch in the room that lay directly under 
her own; several times she threw herself prone upon the 
floor and applied her ear to the boards. That room was 
the one in which they had locked up Dominique. He must 
have been pacing the apartment, for she could hear for a 
long time his regular, cadenced tread passing from the wall 
to the window and back again; then there was a deep si- 
lence; doubtless he had seated himself. The other sounds 
ceased too; everything was still. When it seemed to her 
that the house was simk in slumber she raised her window 
as noiselessly as possible and leaned out. 

Without, the night was serene and balmy. The slender 
crescent of the moon, which was just setting behind Sauval 
wood, cast a dim radiance over the landscape. The length- 
ening shadows of the great trees stretched far athwart the 
fields in bands of blackness, while in such spots as were 
unobscured the grass appeared of a tender green, soft as 
velvet. But Franqoise did not stop to consider the mys- 
terious charm of night. She was scrutinising the country 
and looking to see where the Germans had posted their 
sentinels. She could clearly distinguish their dark forms 
outlined along the course of the Morelle. There was only 
one stationed opposite the mill, on the far bank of the 
stream, by a willow whose branches dipped in the water. 
Franqoise had an excellent view of him; he was a tall young 
man, standing quite motionless with face upturned toward 
the sky, with the meditative air of a shepherd. 

When she had completed her careful inspection of local- 
ities she returned and took her former seat upon the bed. 
She remained there an hour, absorbed in deep thought. 
Then she listened again; there was not a breath to be heard 



2o8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

in the house. She went again to the window and took 
another look outside, but one of the moon's horns was still 
hanging above the edge of the forest, and this circumstance 
doubtless appeared to her unpropitious, for she resumed her 
waiting. At last the moment seemed to have arrived; the 
night was now quite dark; she could no longer discern the 
sentinel opposite her, the landscape lay before her black 
as a sea of ink. She listened intently for a moment, then 
formed her resolve. Qose beside her window was an iron 
ladder made of bars set in the wall, which ascended from 
the mill-wheel to the granary at the top of the building, 
and had formerly served the miller as a means of inspecting 
certain portions of the gearing, but a change having been 
made in the machinery the ladder had long since become 
lost to sight beneath the thick ivy that covered all that 
sfde of the mill. 

Franqoise bravely climbed over the balustrade of the 
little balcony in front of her window, grasped one of the iron 
bars and found herself suspended in space. She com- 
menced the descent; her skirts were a great hindrance to 
her. Suddenly a stone became loosened from the wall and 
fell into the Morelle with a loud splash. She stopped, be- 
numbed with fear, but reflection quickly told her that the 
waterfall, with its continuous roar, was sufficient to deaden 
any noise that she could make, and then she descended 
more boldly, putting aside the ivy with her foot, testing 
each round of her ladder. When she was on a level with 
the room that had been converted into a prison for her lover 
8he stopped. An unforeseen difficulty came near depriving 
her of all her courage: the window of the room beneath was 
not situated directly under the window of her bedroom; 
there was a wide space between it and the ladder, and 
when she extended her hand it only encountered the naked 
wall. 

Would she have to go back the way she came and leave 
her project imaccomplished? Her arms were growing very 
tired; the murmuring of the Morelle, far down below, was 
beginning to make her dizzy. Then she broke off bits of 
plaster from the wall and threw them against Dominique's 



&MILE ZOLA 209 

window. He did not hear; perhaps he was asleq>. Again 
she crumbled fragments from the wall, until the skin was 
peeled from her fingers. Her strength was exhausted; she 
felt that she was about to fall badkward into the stream 
when at last Dominique softly raised his sash. 

"It is I," she murmured. "Take me quick; I am about 
to fall." Leaning from the window he grasped her and 
drew her into the room, where she had a paroxysn of 
weeping, stifling her sobs in order that she might not be 
heard. Then, by a supreme effort of the will she overcame 
her emotion. 

"Are you guarded?" she asked in a low voice. 

Dominique, not yet recovered from his stupefaction at 
seeing her there, made answer by simply pointing toward 
his door. There was a soimd of snoring audible on the 
outside; it was evident that the sentinel had been over- 
powered by sleep and had thrown himself upon the floor 
dose against the door in such a way that it could not be 
opened without arousing him. 

"You must fly," she continued earnestly. "I came here 
to bid you fly and say farewell." 

But he seemed not to hear her. He kept repeating: 

"V^^at, is it you, is it you? Oh, what a fright you gave 
me! You might have killed yoiu-self." He took her hands, 
he kissed them again and again. "How I love you, Fran- 
Qoise! You are as courageous as you are good. The only 
tiling I feared was that I might die without seeing you again; 
but you are here, and now they may shoot me when they 
will. Let me but have a quarter of an hour with you and 
I am ready." 

He had gradually drawn her to him; her head was rest- 
ing on his shoulder. The peril that was so near at hand 
brought them closer to each other, and they forgot every- 
thing in that long embrace. 

"Ah, Frangoise!" Dominique went on in low, cares^g 
tones, "to-day is the fete of Saint Louis, our wedding-day, 
that we have been waiting for so long. Nothing has been 
able to keep us apart, for we are both here, faithful tD our 
appointment, are we not? It is now our weddmg momiiig." 



210 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

''Yes, yes/' she repeated after him, ''our wedcfing 
morning." 

They shuddered as they exchanged a kiss. But suddenly 
she tore herself from his arms; the terrible reality arose 
before her eyes. 

'*You must fly, you must fly," she murmured breath- 
lessly. "There is not a moment to lose." And as he 
stretched out his arms in the darkness to draw her to him 
again, she went on in tender, beseeching tones: "Oh, listen 
to me, I entreat you. If you die, I shall die. In an hour 
it will be daylight. Go, go at once; I command you to go." 

Then she rapidly explained her plan to him. The iron 
ladder extended downward to the wheel; once he had got 
so far he could climb down by means of the buckets and 
get into the boat, which was hidden in a recess. Then 
it would be an easy matter for him to reach the other bank 
of the stream and make his escape. 

'*But are there no sentinels?" said he. 

"Only one, directly opposite here, at the foot of the first 
willow." 

"And if he sees me, if he gives the alarm?" 

Franqoise shuddered. She placed in his hand a knife 
that she had brought down with her. They were silent 

"And your father — ^and you?" Dominique continued. 
"But no, it is not to be thought of; I must not fly. When 
I am no longer here those soldiers are capable of murdering 
you. You do not know them. They offered to spare my 
life if I would guide them into Sauval forest. When they 
discover that I have escaped, their fury will be such that 
they will be ready for every atrocity." 

The girl did not stop to argue the question. To all the 
considerations that he adduced to her one simple answer 
was: "Fly. For the love of me, fly. If you love me, Dom* 
inique, do not linger here a single moment longer." 

She promised that she would return to her bedroom; no 
one should know that she had helped him. She concluded 
by folding him in her arms and smothering him with kisses, 
in an extravagant outburst of passion. He was vanquished. 
He put onlv o«p morp /jiiAcfinr :n her: 



£MILEZOLA 211 

"Wai you swear to me that your father knows what you 
are doing, and that he counsels my flight?" 

"It was my father who sent me to you," Fran^oise un- 
hesij^aingly replied. 

She told a falsehood. At that moment she had but one 
great, overmasterkig longing, to know that he was in safety, 
to escape from the horrible thought that the morning's sun 
was to be the signal for his death. When he should be 
far away, then calannty and evil might burst upon her 
head; whatever fate might be in store for her woiild seem 
endurable, so that only his life might be spared. Before 
and above all other considerations, the selfishness of her 
love demanded that he should be saved. 

"It is well," said Dominique; "I will do as you desire." 

No further word was spoken. Dominique went to the 
window to raise it again. But suddenly there was a noise 
that chilled them with affright. The door was shaken vio- 
lently; they thought that some one was about to open it; 
i^ was evidently a party going the roimds who had heard 
their voices. They stood by the window, dose locked in 
each other's arms, awaiting the event with anguish un- 
speakable. Again there came the rattling at the door, but 
it did not open. Each of them drew a deep sigji of 
relief; they saw how it was. The soldier lying across the 
threshold had turned over in his sleep. Silence was re- 
stored indeed, and presently the snoring began again. 

Dominique insisted that Franqoise should return to her 
room first of all. He took her in his arms, he bade her a 
silent farewell, then helped her to grasp the ladder, and 
himself climbed out on it in turn. He refused to descend 
a single step, however, until he knew that she was in 
her chamber. When she was safe in her room she let 
fall, in a voice scarce louder than a whisper, the words: 

*^Au revoir. I love you!" 

She kneeled at the window, resting her elbows on the sill, 
straining her eyes to follow Dominique. The night was 
still very dark. She looked for the sentinel, but could 
see nothing of him; the willow alone was dimly visible, a 
pale spot upon the surrounding blackness. For a moment 



212 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

she heard the rustling of the ivy as Dominique descended, 
then the wheel creaked, and there was a faint plash which 
told that the young man had found the boat. This was 
confirmed when, a minute later, she descried the shadowy 
outline of the skiff on the grey bosom of the Morelle. Then 
a horrible feeling of dread seemed to clutch her by the 
throat. Every moment she thought she heard the sentry 
give the alarm; every faintest soimd among the dusky 
shadows seemed to her overwrought imagination to be the 
hurrying tread of soldiers, the clash of steel, the dick of 
musket-locks. The seconds slipped by, however, the land- 
scape still preserved its solemn peace. Dominique must 
have landed safely on the other bank. Franqoise no longer 
had eyes for anything. The silence was oppressive, ^d 
she heard the sound of trampling feet, a hoarse cry, the dull 
thud of a heavy body falling. This was followed by 
another silence, even deeper than that which had gone be- 
fore. Then, as if conscious that Death had passed that 
way, she became very cold in presence of the impenetrable 
ni^t. 

IV 

At early daybreak the repose of the mill was disturbed 
by the clamour of angry voices. Father Merlier had gone 
and unlocked Franqoise's door. She descended to the 
courtyard, pale and very calm, but when there, could not 
repress a shudder upon being brought face to face with 
the body of a Prussian soldier that lay on the ground beside 
the well, stretched out upon a cloak. 

Aroimd the corpse soldiers were shouting and gesticulat- 
ing angrily. Several of them shook their fists threatenin^y 
in the direction of the village. The officer had just sent a 
summons to Father Merlier to appear before him in his 
capacity as mayor of the commune. 

"Here is one of our men," he said, in a voice that was 
almost immtelligible from anger, "who was found murdered 
on the bank of the stream. The murderer must be found, 
so that we may make a salutary example of him, and I 
shall expect you to co-operate with us in findmg him." 



•it J 



6MILEZ0LA, 213 

''Whatever you desire," the miller replied, with his cus- 
tomary impassiveness. ''Only it will be no easy matter/' 

The officer stooped down and drew aside the skirt of the 
doak which concealed the dead man's face, disclosing as he 
did so a frightful wound. The sentinel had been struck 
in the throat and the weapon had not been withdrawn 
from the wound. It was a common kitchen-knife, with a 
black handle. 

"Look at that knife," the officer said to Father Merlier. 
"Perhaps it will assist us in our investigation." 

The old man had started violently, but recovered himself 
at once; not a muscle of his face moved as he replied: 

"Every one about here has knives like that. Like enou^ 
your man was tired of fighting and did the business himself. 
Such things have happened before now." 

"Be silent!" the officer shouted in a fury. "I don't know 
what it is that keeps me from setting fire to the four cor- 
ners of your village." 

His anger fortunately kept him from noticing the great 
change that had come over Francoise's countenance. Her 
feelings had compelled her to sit down upon the stone beach 
beside the well. Do what she would she could not remove her 
eyes from the body that lay stretched upon the groimd, al- 
most at her feet. He had been a tall, handsome young man 
in life, very like Dominique in appearance, with blue eyes 
and yellow hair. The resemblance went to her heart. She 
thought that perhaps the dead man had left behind him in 
his German home some sweetheart who would weep for his 
loss. And she recognised her knife in the dead man's throat. 
She had killed him. 

The officer, meantime, was talking of visiting Rocreuse 
with some terrible punishment, when two or three soldiers 
came running in. The guard had just that moment ascer- 
tained the fact of Dominique's escape. The agitation caused 
by the tidings was extreme. The officer went to mspect the 
locality, looked out through the still open window, saw at 
once how the event had hs^pened, and returned in a state 
of exasperation. 

Father Merlier s^peared greatly vexed by Dominique's 



214 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

flight. "The idiot I" he murmured; he has upset every- 
thing." 

Franqoise heard him, and was in an agony of suffermg. 
Her father, moreover, had no su^idon of her complicity. 
He shook his head, saying to her in an undertone: 

"We are in a nice box now!" 

"It was that scoundrel! it was that scoundrel!" cried the 
officer. "He has got away to the woods; but he must be 
found, or the village shall stand the consequences." And 
addressing himself to the miller: "Come, you must know 
where he is hiding?" 

Father Merlier laughed in his silent way, and pointed to 
the wide stretch of wooded hills. 

"How can you expect to find a man in that wilderness?" 
he asked. 

"Oh! there are plenty of hiding-places that you are ac- 
quainted with. I am going to give you ten men; you shall 
act as guide to them." 

"I am perfectly willmg. But it will take a week to beat 
up all the woods of the neighbourhood." 

The old man's serenity enraged the officer; he saw, in- 
deed, what a ridiculous proceeding such a hunt would be. 
It was at that moment that he caught sight of Fran^ise 
where she sat, pale and trembling, on her bench. His at- 
tention was aroused by the girl's anxious attitude. He was 
silent for a moment, glancing suspiciously from father to 
daughter and back again. 

"Is not that man," he at last coarsely asked the old man, 
"your daughter's lover?" 

Father Merlier's face became ashy pale, and he am)eared 
for a moment as if about to throw himself on the officer 
and throttle him. He straightened himself up and made 
no reply. Frangoise had hidden her face in her hands. 

"Yes, that is how it is," the Prussian continued; "switt 
or your daughter have helped him to escape. You are his 
accomplices. For the last time, will you surroider him?** 

The miller did not answer. He had tinned away and was 
looking at the distant landscape with an air of indififerenoe^ 



Ail 



mflLEZOLA 215 

just as if ihe officer were talking to some other person. That 
put the finishing touch to the latter's wrath. 

''Very well, then!" he declared, ''you shall be shot in hb 
stead." 

And agam he ordered out the firing party. Fathar Mer- 
lier was as imperturbable as ever. He scarcely did so much 
as shrug his shoulders; the whole drama appeared to him 
to be in very doubtful taste. He probably believed that 
they would not take a man's life in that unceremonious 
manner. When the platoon was on the ground he gravely 
said: 

"So, then, you are in earnest? Very well, I am willing 
it should be so. If you fed you must have a victim, it may 
as well be I as another." 

But Frangoise arose, greatly troubled, stammering: "Have 
mercy, sir; do not harm my father. KOI me instead of him. 
It was I who helped Dominique to escape; I am the only 
guilty one." 

"Hold your tongue, my girl," Father Merlier exclaimed. 
"Why do you tell sudi a falsehood? She passed the nij^t 
locked in her room, sir; I assure you that she does not 
speak the truth." 

"I am speaking the truth," the girl eagerly replied. "I 
got down by the window; I incited Dominique to fly. It 
is the truth, the whole truth." 

The old man's face was very white. He could read in 
her eyes that she was not lying, and her story terrified him. 
Ah, those children I those children I how they spoiled every- 
thing, with their hearts and their feelings I Then he said 
angrily: 

"She is crazy; do not listen to her. It is a lot of trash 
she is telling you. Come, let us get through with this bu^- 
ness." 

She persisted in her protestations; she kneeled, she raised 
her clasped hands in supplication. The officer stood tran- 
quilly by and watched the harrowing scene. 

**Mon Dieur he said at last, "I take your father because 
the other has escaped me. Bring me back the oflier man^ 
and your father shall have his litorty." 



2i6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

She looked at him for a moment with eyes dilated by the 
horror which his proposal inspired in her. 

"It is dreadful," ^e murmured. ^^Vfhere can I look for 
Dominique now? He is gone; I know nothing beyond that" 

"Well, make your choice between them; him or your 
father." 

"Oh, my God! how can I choose? Even if I knew where 
to find Dominique I could not choose. You are breaking 
my heart. I would rather die at once. Yes, it would be more 
quickly ended thus. Kill me, I beseech you, kill me " 

The officer finally became weary of this scene of despair 
and tears. He cried: 

"Enough of this! I wish to treat you kindly; I will ^ve 
you two hours. If your lover is not here within two hours, 
your father shall pay the penalty that he has incurred." 

And he ordered Father Merlier away to the room that 
had served as a prison for Dominique. The old man asked 
for tobacco, and began to smoke. There was no trace of 
emotion to be descried on his impassive face. Only when he 
was alone he wept two big tears that coursed slowly down 
his cheeks. His poor, dear child, what a fearful trial she 
was enduring I 

FranQoise remained in the courtyard. Prussian soldios 
passed back and forth, laughing. Some of them addressed 
her with coarse pleasantries which she did not understand. 
Her gaze was bent upon the door through which her father 
had disappeared, and with a slow movement she raised her 
hand to her forehead, as if to keep it from bursting. The 
officer turned sharply on his heel, and said to hor: 

"You have two hours. Try to make good use of them.** 

She had two hours. The words kept buzzing, buzzing in 
her ears. Then she went forth mechanically from the court- 
yard; she walked straight ahead with no definite cod 
Where was she to go? what was she to do? She did not 
even endeavour to arrive at any deci^on, for she fdt how 
utterly useless were her efforts. And yet she would have 
liked to see Dominique; they could have come to some 
understanding together, perhaps they might hit on some pUm 
to extricate Aem from their difficulties. And so, amid fbe 



&MILEZOLA 217 

confusion of her whirling thoughts, she took her way down- 
ward to the bank of the Morelle, which she crossed bdow 
the dam by means of some stepping-stones which were there. 
Proceeding onward, still involimtarily, she came to the first 
willow, at the comer of the meadow, and stooping down, 
beheld a sight that made her grow deathly pale — z, pool of 
blood. It was the spot. And she followed the track that 
Dominique had left in the tall grass; it was evident that he 
had run, for the footsteps that crossed the meadow in a 
diagonal line were separated from one another by wide in- 
tervals. Then, beyond that point, she lost the trace, but 
thought she had discovered it again in an adjoining field. 
It led her onward to the border of the forest, where the trail 
came abruptly to an end. 

Though conscious of the futility of the proceeding, Fran- 
^oise penetrated into the wood. It was a comfort to her to 
be alone. She sat down for a moment, then, reflecting that 
time was passing, rose again to her feet. How long was it 
since she left the mill? Five minutes, or a half-hour? She 
bad lost all idea of time. Perhaps Dominique had sought 
concealment in a clearing that she knew of, where they had 
gone together one afternoon and eaten hazel-nuts. She di- 
rected her steps toward the clearing; she searched it thor- 
oughly. A blackbird flew out, whistling his sweet and 
melancholy note; that was all. Then she thought that he 
might have taken refuge in a hollow among the rocks where 
he went sometimes with his gim, but the spot was unten- 
anted. What use was there in looking for him? She would 
never find him, and little by little the desire to discover the 
hiding-place became a passionate longing. She proceeded 
at a more rapid pace. The idea suddenly took possession 
of her that he had climbed into a tree, and thenceforth she 
went along with eyes raised aloft and called him by name 
every fifteen or twenty steps, so that he mi^t know she 
was near him. The cuckoos answered her; a breath of air 
that rustled the leaves made her think that he was there 
and was coming down to her. Once she even imagined that 
she saw him; she stopped with a sense of suffocation, with a 
desire to run away. What was she to say to him? Had she 



2i8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

come there to take him back with her and have him shot? 
Oh I no, ^e would not mention those things; she would 
not tell him that he must fly, that he must not remain in the 
neighbourhood. Then she thought of her father awaiting her 
return, and the reflection caused her most bitter anguish. 
She sank upon the turf, weeping hot tears, crying aloud: 

"My God! My God! why am I here!" 

It was a mad thing for her to have come. And as if seized 
with sudden panic, she ran hither and thither, she sought 
to make her way out of the forest. Three times she lost her 
way, and had begun to think she was never to see the mill 
again, when she came out into a meadow, directly oiqx)site 
Rocreuse. As soon as she caught sight of the villi^ she 
stopped. Was she going to return alone? 

She was standing there when she heard a voice calling ha 
by name, softly: 

"Frangoise ! Frangoise! " 

And ^e beheld Dominique raising his head above the 
edge of a ditch. Just God! she had found him. 

Could it be, then, that Heaven willed his death? She sup- 
pressed a cry that rose to her lips, and slipped into the 
ditch beside him. 

"You were looking for me?" he asked. 

^^es," she replied bewilderedly, scarcely knowing wfaal 
she was saying. 

"Ah! what has happened?" 

She stammered, with eyes downcast: "Why, nothing; I 
was anxious, I wanted to see you." 

Thereupon, his fears alleviated, he went on to tell her 
how it was that he had remained in the vicinity. He was 
alarmed for them. Those rascally Prussians were not wreak- 
ing their vengeance on women and old men. AU had ended 
well, however, and he added, laughing: 

"The wedding will be put off for a week, that's all." 

He became serious, however, upon noticing that her de* 
fection did not pass away. 

"But what is the matter? You are concealing somefhim 
from me." 



AMILB ZOLA U^ 

''No, I give you my m>rd I am not I am tired; I ran 

all the way here." 

He kissed her, saying it was impradent for them both to 
talk there any longer, and was about to dimb out of the 
ditch in order to return to the forest She s^bopped him; 
she was treipbling violently. 

''Listen, Dominique; i)^iiaps it wiD be as wdl for you 
to stay here, after all. There is no one looking for you; you 
have nothing to fear." 

'Trangoise, you are concealmg something from me,'* he 
said again. 

Again she protested that she was concealmg nothing. She 
only liked to know that he was near her. And there were 
other reasons still that she gave in stammering accents. Her 
manner was so strange that no considaiatioa. could now have 
induced him to go away. He believed, moreover, that the 
French would return presently. TnxqM had been seen over 
towards Sauval. 

''Ah! let them make haste; let them come as quickly as 
possible," she murmured fervently. 

At that moment the dock of the church at Rocreuse strudc 
eleven; the strokes reached them, dear and disdnct She 
arose in terror; it was two hours since she had left the milL 

"Listen," she said, with feverish rapidity, ''should we 
need you, I will go up to my room and wave my handker- 
chief from the window." 

And she started off homeward on a run, whfle Dommique, 
greatly disturbed in mind, stretched himsdf at length beside 
the ditch to watch the mill. Just as she was about to enter 
the village Frangoise encountered an old beggar man. Father 
Bontemps, who knew every one and everything in that part 
of the country. He saluted her; he had just seen the mSler, 
he said, surrounded by a crowd of Prussians; then, making 
numerous signs of the Cross and munibling some inarticulate 
words, he went his way. 

"The two hours are tq>," the ofBcer said when Fran^ise 
made her appearance. 

Father Merlier was there, seated on the bendi beside the 
wdL He was smoking stOl. The young g^ agahi pafo ff ered 



220 THE GREAT MODERN PRMCH STORIES 

her supplication, kneeling before the officer and weepiDg, 
Her wi^ was to gain time. The hope that she mi^t yet 
behold the return of the French had heea gaining strength in 
her bosom, and amid her tears and sobs she thou^t sBe could 
distinguish in the distance the cadenced tramp of an advanc- 
ing army. Oh I if they would but come and deliver them aD 
from their fearful trouble! 

"Hear me, sir: grant us an hour, just one little hour. 
Surely you will not refuse to grant us an hour I'* 

But the officer was inflexible. He even ordered two men 
to lay hold of her and take her away, in order that they 
might proceed imdisturbed with the execution of the old 
man. Then a dreadful conflict took place in Fran^oise's 
heart. She could not allow her father to be murdered in 
that manner; no, no, she would die in company with Dom- 
inique rather; and she was just darting away in the direc- 
tion of her room in order to signal to fer fianci, When Dom- 
inique himself entered the courtyard. 

The officer and his soldiers gave a great shout of triumph, 
but he, as if there had been no soul there but Frangoise, 
walked straight up to her: he was perfectly calm, and his 
face wore a slight expression of sternness. 

"You did wrong," he said. "Why did you not bring me 
back with you? Had it not been for Father Bontemps I 
should have known nothing of all this. Well, I am here, at 
all events." 

V 

It was three o'clock. The heavais were piled hi^ with 
great black clouds, the tail-end of a storm that had 
been raging somewhere in the vicinity. Beneath the com)eiy 
sky and ragged scud the valley of Rocreuse, so bright and 
smiling in the sunlight, became a grim chasm, full of dn- 
ister ^adows. The Pnissian officer had done nothing witfi 
Dominique beyond placing him in confinement, giv^ no 
indication of his ultimate purpose in regard to him. Fran- 
^ise, since noon, had been suffering unendurable agony; 
notwithstanding her father's entreaties, she would not leave 
tilie courtyard. She was waiting for the French troops to ap> 



£MILE ZOLA 23i 

« 

pear, but the hours slipped by, id^t was approaching, and 
she suffered all the more since it appeared as if the time 
thus gained would have no effect on the final result. 

About three o'clock, however^ the Prussians began to make 
their preparations for departure. The officer had gone to 
Dominique's room and remained doseted with him for some 
minutes, as he had done the day before. Franqoise knew 
that the young man's life was hanging in the balance; she 
clasped her hands and put up fervent prayers. Beside har 
sat Father Merlier, rigid and silent, d^ining, like the tnie 
peasant he was, to attempt any interference with accom- 
plished facts. 

^^Oh! my God! my God!" Fran^oise ezdaimed, ^^they are 
going to kill him!" 

The miller drew her to him, and took hor on his lap as if 
she had been a little child. At this juncture the officer came 
from the room, followed by two men conducting Dominique 
between them. 

''Never, never!" the latter ezdaimed. '1 am ready to 
die." 

''You had better think the matter over," the oflScer re- 
plied. "I shall have no trouble in finding some one dse to 
render us the service which you refuse. I am generous witfi 
you; I offer you your life. It is simply a matter of guiding 
'US across the forest to Montredon; there must be paths." 

Dominique made no answer. 

"Then you persist in your obstinacy?" 

"Shoot me, and let's have done with it," he replied. 

Frangoise, in the distance, entreated her lover with daisied 
hands; she was forgetful of all considerations save one — 
she would have had him commit a treason. But Father 
Merlier seized her hands, that the Prussians might not see 
the wild gestures of a woman whose mind was disordered 
by her distress. 

"He is right," he murmured, "it is best for him to die." 

The firing-party was in readiness. The officer still had 
hopes of brhiging Dommique over, and was waiting to see 
him exhibit some signs of weakness. Deq> dlence prevailed. 
Heavy peals of thunder were heard in the distance, tiie fields 



222 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

and woods lay lifeless beneath the sweltering heat. And 
it was in the midst of this oppressive silence that suddenly 
the cry arose: 

"The French; the French I" 

It was a fact; they were coming. The line of red trousers 
could be seen advancing along the Sauval road, at the edge 
of the forest. In the mill the confusion was extreme; the 
Prussian soldiers ran to and fro, giving vent to guttural 
cries. Not a shot had been fired as yet. 

"The French! the French!" cried Frangoise, dapping her 
hands for joy. She was like a woman possessed. She had 
escaped from her father's embrace and was laughing boisterr 
ously^ her arms raised high in the air. They had come at 
last, then, and had come in time, since Dominique was still 
there, alive! 

A crash of musketry that rang in her ears like a thunder- 
clap caused her to suddenly turn her head. The officer had 
muttered, "We will finish this bu^ness first," and with his 
own hands pushing Dominique up against the wall of a 
shed, had given the command to ihe squad to fire. When 
Frangoise turned, Dominique was lying on the ground, 
pierced by a dozen bullets. 

She did not shed a tear; she stood there like one suddenly 
rendered senseless. Her eyes were fixed and staring, and she 
went and seated herself beneath the shed, a few steps from 
the lifeless body. She looked at it wistfully; now and then 
she would make a movement with her hands in an aimless, 
childish way. The Prussians had seized Father Merlier as 
a hostage. 

It was a pretty fight. The officer, perceiving that he could 
not retreat without being cut to pieces, rapidly made the best 
disposition possible of his men; it was as well to sell their 
lives dearly. The Prussians were now the defenders of the 
mill, and the French were the attacking party. The mus- 
ketry fire began with unparalled fury; for half an hour there 
was no lull in the storm. Then a deep report was heard, and 
a ball carried away a main branch of the old elm. Tlie 
French had artillery; a battery, in position just beydnd the 
ditch where Dominique bad concealed himself, commanded 



mSILE ZOLA 223 

the main street of Rocreuse. The conflict could not last 
long after that. 

Ah I the poor old mill! The cannon-balls raked it from 
wall to wall. Half the roof was carried away; two of the 
walls fell in. But it was on the side toward the Morelle 
that the damage was most lamentable. The ivy, torn from 
the tottering walls, hung in tatters, debris of every descrip- 
tion floated away upon the bosom of the stream, and 
through a great breach Franqoise's chamber was visible, with 
its little bed, the snow-white curtains of which were care- 
fully drawn. Two balls struck the old wheel in quick suc- 
cession, and it gave one parting groan; the buckets were 
carried away down stream, the frame was crushed into a 
shapeless mass. It was the soul of the stout old mill part* 
ing from the body. 

Then the French came forward to carry the place by 
storm. There was a mad hand-to-hand conflict with the 
bayonet.. Under the dull sky the pretty valley became a 
huge slaughter-pen; the broad meadows looked on in horror, 
with their great isolated trees and their rows of poplars, dot- 
ting them with shade, while to right and left the forest was 
like the walls of a tilting-ground enclosing the combatants, 
and in Nature's universal panic the gentle murmur of the 
springs and water-courses sounded like sobs and wails. 

Frangoise had not stirred from the shed where she re- 
mained hanging over Dominique's body. Father Merlier 
had met his death from a stray bullet. Then the Frendi 
captain, the Prussians being exterminated and the mill on 
fire, entered the courtyard at the head of his men. It was 
the first success that he had gained since the breaking out 
of the war, so, all inflamed with enthusiasm, drawing him- 
self up to the full height of his lofty stature, he laughed 
pleasantly, as a handsome cavalier like him might laug^. 
Then, perceiving poor idiotic Frangoise where she crouched 
between the corpses of her father and her intended, among 
the smoking ruins of the miU, be saluted her gaUantly with 
his sword, and shouted: 

"Victory! Victoryl" 



THE ELIXIR OF THE REV. FATHER 

GAUCHER 

{V &ixif du Phre Gaucher) 
By ALPHONSE DAUDET 

cc'pvRINR this, neij^bour, and teQ me nvfaat yoa tbink 

11 of it." 

"^^^ And drop by drop, with the painstaking care of 
a lapidary counting pearls, the cur£ of Gravescm poured 
out for me two fingers of a golden-green, warm, q[>adding, 
exquisite liqueur. My stomach was as if bathed in sun- 
light. 

''This is Father Gaucher's elixir, the joy and health of 
our Provence," said the worthy man, witii a triumphant 
air; ''it is made at the convent of Pr6montr^ two leagues 
from your mill. Isn't it better than all the chartreuses on 
earth? And if you knew how interesting the story of this 
elixir is! Listen." 

Thereupon, as artlessly as possible, without the riightcat 
tinge of irony, in that parsonage dining-room, so pladd 
and calm, with its Road to the Cross in tiny pictures, and its 
pretty light curtains ironed like surplices, the abb£ began a 
somewhat skeptical and irreverent anecdote, after the faaUoo 
of a tale of Erasmus or d'Assoucy. 

"Twenty years ago, the Pr6montrte, or the White FaHieni 
as we ProvenQals call them, had fallen into utter destitu- 
tion. If you had seen their convent in those days^ it woidd 
have made your heart ache. 

Translated by George Bumham Ives. Copyrighl, 1903, I7 
G. P. Putnam's Sons. 

224 



ALPHONSE DAUDET 22J 

"The high wall, the Pacome Tower, were falling in pieces. 
All around the grass-grown ^tloisters, the pillars were 
cracked, the stone saints crumbling in their recesses. Not 
a stained-glass window whole, not a door that would dose. 
In the courtyards, in the chapels, the wind from the Rhone 
blew as it blows in Camargue, extinguishing the candles, 
breaking the leaden sashes of the windows, filling the 
water from the holy-water vessels. But the saddest of all 
was the convent belfry, silent as an empty dove-cote; and 
the fathers, in default of money to buy a bell, were obliged 
to ring for matins with clappers of almond-wood! 

"Poor White Fathers! I can see them now, in the pro- 
cession on Corpus Christi, pacing sadly along in tiitir 
patched hoods, pale and thin, fed on pumpkins and water- 
melons; and behind them monseigneur the abb6, marching 
with downcast head, ashamed to exhibit in the simlight his 
tarnished crook and his worm-eaten mitre of white wool. 
The ladies of the fraternity wept with compassion in the 
ranks, and the stout banner-bearers whispered sneeringly 
to one another as they pointed to the poor monks: 

" *The starlings grow thin when they fly in flocks.' 

"The fact is, the unfortunate White Fathers had reached 
the point where they asked themselves if they would not 
do better to fly out into the world and to iseek pasturage 
each for himself. 

"Now, one day when this grave question was being dis- 
cussed in the chapter, the prior was informed that Brother 
Gaucher desired to be heard in the council. I must say 
for your information that this Brother Gaucher was the 
drover of the convent; that is to say, he passed his days 
waddling from arch to arch through the cloister, driving 
before him two consumptive cows, which tried to find grass 
between the cracks of the flagstones. Supported until he 
was twelve years old by an old madwoman of the Baux 
coimtry, called Aunt Begon, then taken in by the monks, the 
wretched drover had never been able to learn anything 
except to drive his beasts and to repeat his paternoster: 
and even that he said in Provencal, for his brain was thi"'- 
and his mind as dull as a leaden dagger. A fervent Chris- 



226 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

tian, however, althou^ somewhat visionary, comfortable 
in his haircloth shirt, and inflicting discipline upon himself^ 
with sturdy conviction, and such arms! 

"When they saw him come into the chapter-hall, simple 
and stupid of aspect, saluting the assemblage with a leg 
thrown back, prior, canons, steward, and everybody began 
to laugh. That was always the effect produced by that 
good-natured face with its grizzly, goatlike beard and its 
slightly erratic eyes, whenever it appeared anywhere; so 
that Brother Gaucher was not disturbed thereby. 

" 'Reverend fathers," he said in a wheedling voice, play- 
ing with his chaplet of olive^tones, 4t is quite true that 
empty casks make the best music. Just imagine that, by 
dint of cudgelling my poor brain, which was already so 
hollow, I believe that I have thought out a way to help 
us out of our poverty. 

"'This is how. You know Aunt B6gon, that wOTthy 
woman who took care of me when I was small — God rest 
her soul, the old hag! she used to sing some very vile songs 
after drinking. — I must tell you then, reverend fathers, that 
Aunt Begon, in her lifetime, knew as much about the moun- 
tain herbs as an old Corsican blackbird, and more. In 
fact, towards the end of her life, she compounded an incom- 
parable elixir by mixing five or six kinds of amples that 
we picked together in the moimtains. That was a good 
many years ago; but I believe that wSth the aid of St. 
Augustine and the permission of our worshipful abb£, I 
might, by careful search, discover the composition of that 
mysterious elixir. Then we should only have to bottle it 
and sell it at a rather high price, to enable the community 
to get rich as nicely as you please, like our brothers of La 
Trappe and La Grande- 



"He was not allowed to finish. The prior sprang to 
feet and fell upon his neck. The canons seized his hands. 
The steward, even more deeply moved than all the rest, 
kissed respectfully the ragged edge of his cowl. Then tbcy 
all returned to their chairs to deliberate; and the chaptor 
decided on the spot that the cows should be intrusted to 



ALPHONSE DAVDET 327 

Brother Thrasybule, so that Brother Gaucher mi^t devote 
himself exclusively to the compounding of his dudr. 

''How did the excellent monk succeed in discovering Aunt 
B6gon's recipe I At the price of what efforts, or what 
vi^s? History does not say. But this much is sure, that 
after six months, the elixir of the White Fathers was vary 
popular. Throughout the Comtat, in all the Aries country, 
there was not a farmhouse, not a granary, which had not 
in the depths of its buttery, amid the bottles of mulled 
wine and the jars of olives i la picholine, a little jug of 
brown earthemware, sealed with the arms of Provence, 
and with a monk in a trance on a silver label. Thanks to 
the popularity of its elixir, the convent of the Pr6montr6s 
grew rich very rapidly. The Pac6me Tower was rebuflt 
The prior had a new mitre, the church some pretty stained 
windows; and in the fine openwork of the belfry, a whole 
legion of bells, large and small, burst forth one fine Easter 
morning, jingling and chiming with all their might 

"As for Brother Gaucher, that unfortimate lay brother, 
whose rustic manners amused the chapter so much, was 
never spoken of in the convent. Henceforth they only knew 
the Reverend Father Gaucher, a man of brains and of great 
learning, who lived completely apart from the trivial and 
multifarious occupations of the cloister, and was shut up 
all day in his distillery, while thirty monks himted fhe 
mountain for him, seeking fragrant herbs. That distillery 
which no one, not even the prior, had the ri^t to enter, was 
an old abardoned chapel, at the end of the canons' garden. 
The simplicity of the worthy fathers had transformed it 
into something mysterious and redoubtable; and if by chance 
some audacious and inquisitive young monk happened to 
get as far as the rosework of flie doorway, he retreated 
very quickly, terrified by the aspect of Father Gaucher, with 
his sorcerer's beard, leaning over his furnaces, scales in 
hand; and all about him retorts of red sandstone, huge 
alembics, serpentine glasses, a whole strange outfit, flam- 
ing as if bewitched, in the red gleam of the stained-glass. 

''At nightfall, when the last Angdus rang, the door of 



228 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

that abode of mystery would open softly, and the father 
would betake himself to the church for the evening service. 
You should have seen the welcome that he received when 
be passed through the monastery I The brethren drew up in 
two lines for hhn to pass. They said to one another: 

"*Hush! he knows the secret!' 

'^The steward followed him and spoke to him with down- 
cast eyes. Amid all this adulation, the father walked along, 
mopping his forehead, his broad-brimmed, three-comer^ 
hat placed on the back of his head like a halo, glancing with 
an air of condescension at the great courtj^uxls full of 
orange-trees, the blue roofs surmounted by new weather- 
vanes; and, in the cloister, glaringly white between the 
gracefully carved pillars, the monks, newly dressed, march- 
ing two by two with placid faces. 

"'They owe all this to me I' the father would say to 
himself; and every time that thought caused his bosom to 
swell with pride. 

"The poor man was well punished for it, as you will see. 

"Imagine that one evening, during the service, he ar- 
rived in the church in a state of extraordinary excitement: 
red-faced, breathless, his hood awry, and so perturbed that 
when he took his holy-water he wet his sleeves to the elbow. 
They thought at first that his excitement was due to being 
late; but when they saw him make profound reverences to 
the organ and the galleries instead of saluting the main 
altar, when they saw him rush through the church like a 
gust of wind, wander about the choir for five minutes lodL- 
ing for his stall, and, when once seated, bow to the right 
and left with a beatific smile, a murmur of amazement ran 
through the three naves. From breviary to breviary the 
monks whispered: 

"What can be the matter with our Father Gaucher? 
What can be the matter with our Father Gaucher?" 

"Twice the prior, in his annoyance, struck his crook on the 
flagstones to enjoin silence. In the choir the psalms con- 
tinued; but the responses lacked vigour. 

"Suddenly, in the very middle of the Ave terum, lo and 



ALPHONSB DAUDET 229 

behold Father Gaudier fell backward in his stall and chanted 
in a voice of thunder: 

" 'In Paris there is a White Father— 
Patatin, patatan, tarabin, taraban.'" 

^'General consemation. Everybody rose. 

'''Carry him away! he is possessed!' they cried. 

"The canons crossed thetnsdves. Monsdgneur's crook 
waved frantically. But Father Gaucher neither saw nor 
heard anything; and two sturdy monks were obliged to drag 
him away throu^ the small door of the choir, strugg^g 
like one bewitched and contimung his paiatans and his 
tarabans louder than ever. 

"The next morning, at daybreak, the poor wretob was on 
his knees in the prior's oratory, confessing his sin with a 
flood of tears. 

" 'It was the elixir, monseigneur, it was the elixir that 
took me by surprise,' he said, b^tmg his breast. And 
seeing him so heartbroken, so penitent, the good prior was 
deeply moved himself. 

" 'Come, come, Father Gaucher, calm yourself; all this 
will dry up like the dew in the sunshme. After all, the 
scandal was not so great as you think. To be sure there 
was a song which was a little — ^however, we must hope that 
the novices did not hear it. Now, tell me just how the 
thing happened to you. It vas while you were trymg the 
elixir, was it not? Your hand was a little too heavy. Yes, 
yes, I understand. It was like Brother Schwartz, the mven- 
tor of powder; you were the victim of your invention. And 
tell me, my dear friend, is it really necessary that you 
should try this terrible elixir upon yourself?' 

" 'Unluckily, yes, monseigneur. The test-tube, to be sure, 
gives me the strength and degree of heat of the alcohol; 
but for the finishing touch, the velvety smoothness, I can 
trust nothing but iny tons^ue.' 

" *Ah! very good. But listen to what I ask. When you 
taste the elixir thus as a duty, does it taste good to you? 
Do you enjoy it?' 



230 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

'^ 'Alas I yes, monselgneiir/ said the unhai^y father, tuni- 
ing as red as a beet; 'for two evenings now I have found 
such a bouquet, such an aroma in it! It b certiunly the 
devil who has played me this vile trick. So I have deter- 
mined only to use the test-tube henceforth. If the liqueur 
is not as tine, if it is not as smooth as before, so much the 
worse!' 

" 'Do nothing of the sort/ interrupted the prior, earnestly. 
'We must not take the risk of di^leasing our customers. 
All that you have to do now that you are warned is to be 
on your guard. Tell me, how much do you need to drink, 
for your test? Fifteen or twenty drops, is it not? Let 
us say twenty drops. The devil will be very smart if he 
can catch you with twenty drops. Moreover, to avert all 
chance of accident, I excuse you from coming to church 
henceforth. You will repeat the evening service in the dis- 
tillery. And now, go in peace, my father, and above all 
things count your drops carefully.' 

"Alas! the poor father counted his drops to no puxpose; 
the demon had him in his dutch, and he did not let him go. 

"The distillery heard some strange servicesi 

"In the daytime everything went well. The father was 
tranquil enough; he prepared his retorts, his alembics, care- 
fully assorted his herbs — all Provenqal herbs, fine and gray, 
and burned with perfume and sunli^.t. But at nighty when 
the simples were steeped and the elixir was cooling in great 
basins of red copper, the poor man's martyrdom began. 

" ^Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty.' 

"The drops fell from the tube into the silver goblet 
Those twenty, the father swallowed at one draught, ahnodt 
without enjoyment.. It weis only the twenty-first that 
aroused his longing. Oh! that twenty-first drop! To avoid 
temptation, he would go and kneel at the end of the labora- 
tory and bury himself in his paternosters. But from the 
still warm liqueur there ascended a wreath of smoke heavily 
laden with aromatiq odours, which came prowling Bixmi. 
him, and drew him back towards the basins, whether he 
woidd or no. The liqueur was a beautiful golden-green. 
Leaning over it, with distended nostrils, tha father stined 



ALPHONSB DAVDBT aji 

it gently "with his tube, and it seemed to him that he saw, 
in the ^arkling little sptogles on the surface of the emerald 
lake, Aunt 66gon's eyes lau^iing^and snapiung as they 
looked at him. 

"'Nonsense! just one more dropl' 

"And from drop to drop the poor wretch ended by filling 
his goblet to the brim, llien, at ihe end of his strength, he 
would sink down in an easy-chair; and his body idaxed, 
his eyes half closed, he woidd enjoy his sin by little s^ 
immuring to himself with ecstatic remorse: 

" 'Ahl I am damning m3rself ! I am damning mysdfl' 

"The most terrible part of it was, that in the depths of 
diabolical elixir, he remembered, by some witchery or other, 
all Aunt B^gon's naughty songs: 'There were three little 
gossips, who talked of giving a feast'; or, 'Master Andre's 
shepherdess goes to the woods alone'; and always the famous 
one of the White Fathers: Tatatin, patatani' 

"Imagine his confusion the next day when his old ndg^- 
hours said to him with a sly expression: 

"'Hal ha I Father Gaucher, you had grasshoppers in 
your head when you went to bed last night' 

"Then there were tears, despair, fasting, hairdoth, and 
penance. But nothing could prevail against the demon of 
the elixir; and every evening, at the same hour, the pos- 
session began anew. 

"Meanwhile, orders rained upon the abbey like a bless- 
ing from Heaven. They came from Nimes, from Aix, from 
Avignon, from Marseille. From day to day the convent as- 
sumed the aspect of a factory. There were packing brothers^ 
labelling brothers, brothers to attend to the correspondence, 
draymen brothers; the service of God lost a few strokes of 
the bell now and then, to be sure, but the poor people of 
the neighbourhood lost nothing, I assure you. 

'*But one fine Sunday morning, while the steward was 
reading to the chapter his annual mventory, and the good 
canons were listening with ^)arkling eyes and smiling lips, 
behold Father Gaucher rushed into the midst of the con* 
ference, exclaiming: 



232 THE GREAT MODEJtX FREXCH STORIES 



U {} 



'It b aS over! I can't stand h any longer! gve m? 
back my a/Hi's.' 

'' '^\'hat i£ the matter, pray. Father Gandwr?' asked Ae 
prior, who had a shrewd idea what the matter man^t be. 

'' 'The matter, monseigneur? The matter is fliat I am 
laying up for m>'self an eternity of heD-fire and blows with 
the pitd^forL The matter is that I am drinkiqg, drinking 
like a miserable wretch.* 

'* 'But I told you to count your drops.' 

'* 'Count my drops! Oh, yes! I should have to ooont 
them by goblets now. Yes, my fathers, I have readied that 
point. Ihree flasks an evening. You must see that that 
cannot last. So let whomsoever you dioose make the dizir. 
May (lod's fire consume me if I touch it again!' 

''Tlie chapter laughed no longer. 

'' 'But you are ruining us, unbappy man!' cried the 
steward, waving his ledger. 

" 'Do you prefer that I shoidd damn myself forever?' 

"Thereupon the prior rose. 

" 'My fathers/ he said, putting forth hb beautiful Y/bite 
hand, upon which the pastoral ring glistened, 'there is a 
way to arrange everything. It is at ni^t, is it not, my dear 
s(in, that the demon tempts you?' 

" 'Yes, monsieur prior, regularly every evening. So now, 
wh(?n night comes, a cold sweat takes irfe, saving your 
j)r(^sence, like Cs^itou's donkey when he saw the saddle 
coming.' 

" ' Tis well I be comforted. Henceforth, every evenmg, 
at the service, we will repeat in your favour the prayer of 
St. Augustine, to which plenary indulgence is attached. 
With that, whatever happens, you are safe. It affords abso- 
lution during sin.' 

" 'Oh well! in that case, thanks, monsieur prior!' 

"And, without asking anything more. Father Gaucher 
returned to his laboratory, as light-hearted as a lark. 

"And in truth, from that day forward, every evening at 
the end of the complines, the officiating father never failed 
to say: 

" 'Let us pray for our poor Father Gaucher, mdio js 



ALPHONSE DAUDET 233 

sacrificing his soul in the interest of the community. Ore* 

mus, Dominie * 

''And while the prayer ran quivering over those ivhite 
hoods, prostrate in the shadow of the nave, as a li^t breese 
rushes over the snow, yonder at the oUier end of the con- 
vent, behind the flaming stained-glass of the distiUeiyy 
Father Gaucher could be heard singmg at the top of Us 
lungs: 

*"In Paris there is a White Fadier» 
Patatin, patatan, tarabin, taraban; 
In Paris there is a White Fadier 

Who dances with the nuns, 

Trin, trin, trin, in a garden. 

Who dances with the "* 

Here the good cur6 stopped, in dismay. 
''Merciful Heaven I" he exdaimed, ^^sappoat my parish- 
ioners should hear me!'' 



FATHER AND SON 

(Hautot Ptre et Fits) 
By GUY DE MAUPASSANT 



T[E dogs fastened to the apple trees in the grounds in 
front of the house were giving tongue at fbt sight of 
the game bags carried by the gamekeepers and small 
boys. It was half farm and half manor house, one of those 
quasi seignorial country residences, now occupied by large 
farmers. In the spacious dining-room-kitchen, Hautot ^ 
nior and Hautot Junior, M. Bermont, the tax collector, and 
M. Mondaru, the notary, were eating a mouthful and drink- 
ing a glass before going out shooting, for it was the first day 
of the season. 

Hautot Senior, proud of all his possessions, talked boast- 
fully of the game which his guests were going to find on his 
lands. He was a big Norman, one of those powerful, ruddy 
men, with large bones, who lift wagon loads of aisles on 
their shoulders. Half peasant, half gentleman, rich, re- 
spected, influential, autocratic, he obliged his son C^sar to 
go through the third form at college so that he migjit be 
an educated man, and there he had broujE^t his studies to 
aji end, for fear of his becoming a fine gentleman and paying 
n^ attention to the land. 

C6sar Hautot, almost as tall as his father, but thinner, 
was a good son, docile, content with everything, fiill of ad- 
xniratioTi, respect, and deference for the vdshes and opinioiis 
of Hautot Senior. 

Translated by A. E. Henderson, B. A., and Mme. Louise 
Quesada. Copyright, 191 1, by P. F. G)llier & Sons. 

234 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 23S 

M. Bermont, the tax collector, a stout little man, who 
showed on his red cheeks a thin network of violet veins re- 
sembling the tributaries and the winding courses of rivers 
on maps, asked: 

"And hares — are there any hares?" 

Hautot Senior answered: 

"As many as you wish, especially in the Puysatier land." 

"How shall we set out?" asked the notary, an epicure of 
a notary, pale and corpulent, with a brand-new iiunting cos- 
tume, belted in, that he had bought at Rouen. 

"Well, that way, through the bottoms. We will drive 
the partridges into the plain, and we can get them there." 

And Hautot Senior rose up. They all followed his ex- 
ample, took their guns out of the comers, examined the' 
locks, stamped their feet in order to adjust their boots, 
which were rather hard, not having become flexible from 
wear. Then they went out; and the dogs, standing on their 
hind legs at the ends of their leashes, gave tongue while 
beating the air with their paws. 

They set out toward the bottoms referred to. These con- 
sisted of a little valley, or, rather, a long, undulating stretch 
of poor land, which had on that account remained unculti- 
vated, furrowed with ditches and covered with ferns, an 
excellent preserve for game. 

The sportsmen took up their positions at some distance 
from each other, Hautot Senior at the right, Hautot Junior 
at the left, and the two guests in the midcHe. The game- 
keeper, and the men carrying the game bags, followed. It 
was the solemn moment when the first shot is awaited, when 
the heart beats a little, while the nervous finger keeps fed- 
ing the trigger. 

Suddenly a shot went off. Hautot Senior had fired. They 
all stopped, and saw a partridge separate from a covey whicK 
had risen » and fall 'down into a deep ditch under a thick 
growth of brush. The sportsman, becoming excited, rushed 
forward with rapid strides, thrusting aside the briars which 
stood in his path, and disappeared in his turn into the thicket, 
in quest of his game. 

Almost at the same instant, a second shot was heard. 



236 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

^'Hal ha! the rascal!" exclaimed M. Bermont, 'lie must 
have started a hare down there." 

They all waited, with their eyes riveted on the mass of 
brush which their gaze failed to penetrate. 

The notary, making a speaking trumpet of his hands, 
shouted: 

"Have you got them?" 

Hautot Senior made no re^x)nse. 

Then Cesar, turning toward the gamekeeper, said: 

"Just go and as^st him, Joseph. We must keq> walking 
in line. We'll wait." 

And Joseph, an old stump of a man, lean and knotty, all 
of whose joints formed protuberances, set off at an easy 
pace down into the ditch, searching every opening through 
which a^ passage could be effected with the cautiousness of 
a fox. "Then, suddenly, he cried: 

"Oh! come! come! an accident has occurred." 

They all hurried forward, plunging through the briars. 

The elder Plautot had fallen on his side, in a faint, with 
both hands pressed to his abdomen, from which blood trickled 
through his shooting jacket, torn by a bullet. Letting go of 
his gun, in order to pick up the dead partridge, he had let the 
firearm fall, and the second discharge, going off with the 
shock, had torn open his entrails. They drew him out of the 
trench, removed his clothes, and saw a frightful wound, 
through which the intestines protruded. Then, after having 
ligatured him the best way they could, they brou^t him 
back to his own house, and awaited the doctor, who had been 
sent for, as well as the priest. 

When the doctor arrived he gravely shook his head, and, 
tinning toward yoimg Hautot, who was sobbing on a chair, 
he said: 

"My poor boy, this does not look favourable." 

But, when the wound was dressed, the wounded man 
moved his lingers, opened his mouth, then his eyes» cast 
around him troubled, haggard glances, then appeared to be 
trying to recall, to understand, and he murmiured: 

"Ah! good God! this has finished mel" 

The doctor held his hand. 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 237 

"Why, no; why, no; some days of rest merdy — ^it will be 
nothing." 

Hautot returned: 

"It has finished mel My abdomen is gashedl I know^ 
it well." 

Then, all of a sudden: 

"I want to talk to my son, if I have time." 

Hautot Jimior, in spite of himself, shed tears, and kept 
rej)eating like a little boy: 

"Papa, papa, poor papa!" 

But the father, in a firm tone, said: 

"Come! stop crying — this is no time for it. I have some- 
thing to say to you. Sit down there, quite dose to me. It 
will not take long, and I shall be more calm. As for the 
rest of you, kindly leave us alone for a minute." 

They all went out, leaving the father and son together. 

As soon as they were alone: 

"Listen, son!" he said, "you are twenty-four; one can 
talk to you. And then there is not such mystery about 
these matters as we attach to them. You know, do you 
not, that your mother has been dead seven years, and that I 
am not more than forty-five years mysdf, seeing that I was 
married at nineteen. Is not that true?" 

The son faltered: 

"Yes, it is true." 

"So then your mother is dead seven years, and I have 
remained a widower. Well! a man like me cannot remain 
without a \wfe at thirty-seven, isn*t that true?" 

The son replied: 

"Yes, it is true." 

The father, out of breath, very pale, and his face con- 
tracted with suffering, went on: 

"God! how I suffer! Well, you imderstand. Man is not 
made to live alone, but I did not want to take a successor 
to your mother, since I promised her not to do so. There- 
fore — you understand?" 

"Yes. father." 

"Well, I kept a young pirl at Rouen, number eighteen. Rue 
de r£perlan, on the third floor, the second door — ^I am tdl- 



238 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCB STORIES 

ing ycu all this, don't forget — ^a young girl, who has 
very nice to me, loving, de\'oted, a true wcnoan, A? You 
understand, my lad?" 

•*Yes, father." 

'*So then, if I am carried off, I owe something to her, 
something substantial, that will place her be3rond the reach 
of want. You understand?'* 

"Yes, father." 

*'I tell you that she is a pood girl, and, but for you, and 
the remembrance of vour mother, and also because we three 
lived together in this house, I would have brought her here, 
and then married her Listen — listen, my boy — ^I might have 
made a ^11 — I haven't done so. I did not wish to do so— 
for it is not necessary to write down things — thin^ of this 
sort — it is too damaging to the legitimate children — and 
then it makes confusion — it ruins every one! Look you — 
lawj'ers, there's no need of them — ^never consult one. If I 
am rich, it is because I never employed one in all my 
life. You understand, my son?" 

"Yes, father." 

"Listen acain — listen attentively! So then, I have made 
no will — 1 did not desire to do so— and then I knew you; 
you have a pood heart, you are not covetous, not stingy, and 
I said to myself that when my end approached I would tell 
you all about it, and that I would beg of you not to forget 
the girl. And then, listen again! When I am gone, go and 
see her at once — and make such arrangements that she may 
not blame my memory. You have plenty of means. You 
can spare it — I leave you enough. Listen! You won't find 
her at home every day in the week. She works at Madame 
Moreau's in the Rue Beauvoisine. Go there on a Thursday. 
That is the day she expects me. It has been my day for 
the past six years. Poor little girl! she will weep! I say 
all Uiis to you, because I know you so well, my son. One 
does not tell these things in public, either to the notary or 
to the priest. They happen — every one knows that— but 
they are not talked about, save in case of necessity. Then 
there must be no outsider in the secret, nobody except the 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 239 

family, because the family consists of one person alone. 
You understand?" 

"Yes, father." 

"Do you promise?" 

"Yes, father." 

"Do you swear it?" 

"Yes, father." 

"I beg of you, I implore of you, son, do not forget. I 
insist on this." 

"No, father." 

"You will go yourself. I want you to make sure of 
everything." 

"Yes, father." 

"And then, you will see — you will see what she will ex- 
plain to you. As for me, I can say no more to you. You 
have sworn to do it." 

"Yes, father." 

"That's good, my son. Embrace me. Farewell. I am 
going to die, I'm sure. Tell them they may come in." 

Young Hautot embraced his father, groaning as he did so; 
then, always docile, he opened the door, and the priest ap- 
peared in a white surplice, carrying the holy oils. 

But the dying man had closed his eyes and refused to 
open them again; he refused to answer, and even to show 
by a sign that he understood. 

He had talked enough, this man; he could speak no 
longer. Besides, he now felt his heart at ease and wanted 
to die in peace. What need had he to make a confession 
to this deputy of God, since he had just confessed 
to his son, who constituted his familv? 

He received the last rites, was purified, and received ab- 
solution, surrounded by his friends and his servants on their 
bended knpp<;. vnthout any movement of his face indicating 
that he st'^l li^T^. 

He expired about midnieht, after four hours of spasms, 
which showed that he must have suffered dreadfully. 

II 

He was buried on Tuesday, the shooting season having 



240 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

opened on Sunday. On returning home after the funeral 
C6sar Hautot spent the rest of the day ^veeping. He 
scarcely slept that night, and felt so sad on awaking that 
he asked himself how he could go on living. 

However, he kept thinking &at, in order to obey Us 
father's d3nng wish, he must go to Rouen the following day, 
and see this girl Caroline Donet, who lived at ei^teen Rue 
d' £perlan the third storey second door. He had muttered 
to himself this name and address a countless number of times, 
just as a child repeats a prayer, so that he mi^t not forget 
them, and he ended by repeating them continually, without 
thinking, so impressed were they on his mind. 

Accordingly, on the following day, about eight o'clock, 
he ordered Graindorge to be harnessed to the tilbury, and 
set forth, at the long, swinging pace of the heavy Norman 
horse, along the high road from Ainville to Rouen. He wore 
his black frock coat, his tall silk hat, and his trousers strapped 
under his shoes, and, being in mourning, did not put on his 
blue dust coat. 

He entered Rouen just as it was striking ten o'clock, put 
up, as he had always done, at the Hotel des Bons-Enfants, 
in the Rue des Trois-Mares, and submitted to the embraces 
of the landlord and his wife and their five children, for they 
had heard the melancholy news; after that, he had to teU 
them all the particulars of the accident, which caused him 
to shed tears; to repel all the proffered attentions which they 
sought to thrust upon him merely because he was wealthy; 
and to decline even the limcheon they wanted him to par- 
take of, thus woimding their sensibilities. 

Then, having wiped the dust off his hat, brushed his coat, 
and removed the mud stains from hb boots, he set forth in 
search of the Rue de I'fperlan, without venturing to make 
inquiries from any one, for fear of being recognized and of 
arousing suspicion. 

At length, unable to find the place, he saw a priest passing 
by, and, trusting to the professional discretion of the clergy, 
he questioned the ecclesiastic. 

He had only a hundred steps farther to go; it was the 
second street to the right. 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 241 

Then he hesitated. Up to that moment he had obeyed, 
like a mere animal, the expressed wish of the deceased. 
Now he felt quite agitated, confused, htmiiliated, at the idea 
of finding himself — the son — in the presence of this woman 
who had been his father's sweetheart. All the morality we 
possess, which lies buried at the bottom of our emotions 
through centuries of hereditary instruction, all that he bad 
been taught since he had learned his catediism about crea- 
tures of evil life, the instinctive contempt which every man 
entertains toward them, even though he may marry one of 
them, all the narrow honesty of the peasant in his char- 
acter, was stirred up within him, and held him back, making 
him grow red with shame. 

But he said to himself: 

**I promised the father. I must not break my promise.'' 

So he pushed open the partly opened door of number 
eighteen, saw a gloomy-looking staircase, ascended three 
flights, perceived a door, then a second door, saw a bell 
rope, and pulled it. The ringing, which resounded in the 
apartment, sent a shiver through his frame. The door 
was opened, and he found himself face to face with a wdl- 
dressed young lady, a brunette with rosy cheeks, who gazed 
at him with eyes of astonishment. 

He did not know what to say to her, and she, who sus- 
pected nothing, and who was waiting for the father, did not 
invite him to come in. They stood looking thus at one 
another for nearly half a minute, at the end of which she 
said in a questioning tone: 

"Do you want anything, monsieur?" 

He falteringly replied: 

"I am M. Hautot's son." 

She Rave a start, turned pale, and stammered out as if 
she had known him for a long time: 

"Monsieur Cesar?" 

"Yes " 

"And what then?" 

"I have come with a message to you from my father." 

She exclaimed: 

"Oh, my God!" and then drew back so that he mig^t 



242 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

enter. He shut the door and followed her into the apart- 
ment. Then he perceived a little boy of four or five years 
playing with a cat, seated on the floor in front of a stove, 
from which rose an odour of food being kept hot. 

"Take a seat," she said. 

He sat down. 

"Well?" she questioned. 

He no longer ventured to speak, keying his eyes fixed on 
the table which stood in the centre of the room, with three 
covers laid on it, one of which was for a child, and a bottle 
of claret that had been opened, and one of white wine that 
had not been uncorked. He glanced at the chair with its 
back turned to the fire. That was his father's diair! They 
were expecting him. That was his bread which he saw at 
his place, for the crust had been removed on account of 
Hautot^s bad teeth. Then, raising his eyes, he noticed on 
the wall his father's portrait, the large photograph taken at 
Paris the year of the exhibition, the same as that which 
hung above the bed in the sleeping apartment at AinviUe. 

The young woman again asked: 

"Well, Monsieur C6sar? 

He kept staring at her. Her face was livid with anxiety, 
and she waited, her hands trembling with fear. 

Then he took courage. 

"Well, mam'zelle, papa died on Simday last just after 
he had opened the shooting season." 

She was so overwhelmed that she did not move. After 
a silence of a few seconds, she faltered in an almost inaudible 
tone: 

"Oh, it is not possible!" 

Then, on a sudden, tears came into her eyes, and, cover- 
fag her face ^Aith her hands, she burst out sobbing. 

At that point the little boy turned round, and, seeing his 
mother weeping, began to roar. Then, realizing that this 
sudden trouble was brought about by the stranger, he rushed 
at Cesar, caught hold of his trousers with one hand and with 
the other hit him with all his strength on the thigh. And 
Cesar remained bewildered, deeply affected; with this woman 
mourning for his father on the one hand, and the little boy 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 243 

defending his mother on the other. He fdt their ^notion 
taking possession of him, and his eyes were beginning to 
fill with tears; so, to recover his self-conmiand, he began 
to talk: 

"Yes," he said, "the accident occurred on Sunday, at 
eight o'clock " 

And he told all the facts as if she were listening to him, 
without forgetting a single detail, mentioning the most trivial 
matters \vith the minuteness of a countryman. And the 
child still kept attacking him, kicking his ankles. 

When he came to what his ifather had said about her, she 
took her hands from her face and said: 

"Pardon me! I was not following you; I would like to 
know Would you mind beginning over again?" 

He repeated everything in the same words, with pauses 
and reflections of his own from time to time. She listened 
eagerly now, perceiving, with a woman's keen sensibility, 
all the sudden changes of fortime which his narrative implied, 
and trembling with horror, every now and then exclaiming: 

"Oh, my God!" 

The little fellow, believing that she had calmed down, 
ceased beating Cesar, in order to take his mother's hand, and 
he listened, too, as if he understood. 

When the narrative was finished, young Hautot continued: 

"Now, we will settle matters together, in accordance with 
his wishes. I am well off, he has left me plenty of means. 
I don't want you to have anything to complain about " 

But she quickly interrupted him. 

"Oh! Monsieur Cesar, Monsieur Cesar, not today. I am 
cut to the heart — another time — another day. No, not to- 
day. If I accept, listen — it is not for myself — ^no, no, no, I 
swear it to you, it is for the child. Besides, this sum will be 
placed to his account." 

Thereupon, Cesar, horrified, guessed the truth, and stam- 
mered: 

"So then — it is his — the child?" 

"Why, yes," she said. 

And Hautot Junior gazed at his brother with a confused 
emotion, intense and p>ainful. 



244 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

After a long silence, for she had btgaa to weep afresh, 

C6sar, quite embarrassed, went on: 

''Well, then, Mam'zelle Donet, I am gomg. When noold 
you wish to talk this ovtf with me?" 

She exclaimed: 

"Oh! no, don't go! don't go! Don't leave me all alone 
with Emile. I would die of grief. I have no longer any 
one, any one but my child. Oh! what wretchedness^ what 
wretchedness, Monsieur C^sar! Come, sit down again. Tdl 
me something more. Tell me what he did at hraie all the 
week." 

And Cdsar resumed his seat, accustomed to obey. 

She drew over another chair for herself in front of the 
stove, where the dishes had all this time been heating, took 
£mile upon her knees, and asked C6sar a thousand questiras 
about his father — questions of an intimate nature, which 
made him feel, without reasoning on the subject, that she had 
loved Hautot with all the strength of her weak woman's 
heart. 

And, by the natural sequence of his ideas — which were 
rather limited in number — ^he recurred once more to the acci- 
dent, and set about telling the stoiy over again, with all the 
same details. 

When he said: 

"He had a hole in his stomach that you could put your 
two fists into/' she gave a sort of shriek, and her eyes again 
filled with tears. 

Then, seized by the contagion of her grief, C^sar b^an 
to weep, too, and as tears dways soften the fibres of the 
heart, he bent over Emile, whose forehead was close to his 
own mouth, and kissed him. 

The mother, recovering her breath, murmured: 

"Poor child, he is an orphan now!" 

"And so am I," said C6sar. 

And they were silent. 

But suddenly the practical instinct of the housewife, ac- 
customed to ihink of everything, revived in the young 
woman's breast. 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 245 

"You have perhaps had nothing to eat all the morning, 
Mondeur C6sar." 

"No, mam'zelle. ^ 

"Oh I you must be hungry. You will eat a morsd." 

"Thank you," he said, "I am not himgry; I have had too 
much sorrow." 

She replied: 

"In spite of sorrow, we must live. You will not refuse 
to let me get something for you! And thai you will remain 
a little longer. When you are gone, I don't know what will 
become of me." 

He yielded after some further resistance, and, sitting down 
with his back to the fire, facing her, he ate a plateful of tripe, 
which had been drying up in the gravy, and drank a glass 
of red wine. But he would not allow her to imcork the bottle 
of white wine. He several times wiped the mouth of the 
little boy, who had smeared all his chhi with gravy. 

As he rose to take his leave, he asked: 

"When would you like me to come back to talk about 
this matter, Mam'zelle Donet?" 

"If it is all the same to you, say next Thursday, Monsieur 
C^sar. In that way I shall not waste my time, as I always 
have my Thursdays free." 

"That will suit me — ^next Thursday." 

"You will come to luncheon, won't you?" 

"Oh! As to that I can't promise." 

"The reason I suggested it is, that people can chat better 
when they are eating. One has more time, too." 

"Well, be it so. About twelve o'clock, then." 

And he took his departure, after he had again kissed little 
Emile, and pressed Mademoiselle Donet's hand. 

Ill 

The week appeared long to Cesar Hautot. He had never 
before lived alone, and the isolation seemed to him unen- 
durable. Till now. he had lived at his father's side, just 
like his shadow, followed him into the fields, superintended 
the execution of his orders, and if they were separated for 



246 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

a short time they again met at dimier. They spent the 
evenings smoking their pipes together, sitting oppo»te each 
other, chatting about horses, cows, or sheep; and the grip 
of their hands when they rose in the morning was a manifes- 
tation of deep family affection. 

Now Cesar was alone. He went mechanically about his 
autumn duties on the farm, expecting any moment to see his 
father's tall, energetic outline ri^g up at the end of a level 
field. To kill time, he visited his nei^bours, told about the 
accident to all who had not heard of it, and sometimes re- 
peated it to the others. Then, having exhausted his occu- 
I)ations and his reflections, he would sit down at the ^de 
of the road, asking himself whether this kind of life was going 
to last forever. 

He frequently thought of Mademoiselle Donet. He liked 
her. He considered her thoroughly respectable, a gentle, 
good young woman, as his father had said. Yes, undoubt- 
edly she was a good girl. He resolved to act handsomely 
toward her, and to give her two thousand francs a year, 
settling the capital on the child. He even experience a 
certain ji^leasure in thinking that he was going to see her 
on the followinjT Thursdav and arrange this matter with her* 
And then the thought of this brother, this little ch^ of five, 
who was his father's son, worried him, annoyed him a little, 
and, at the same time, pleased him. He had, as it were, a 
family in this youngster, sprung from a clandestine alliance, 
who would never bear the name of Hautot — a family which 
he might take or lea\'e, just as he pleased, but which re- 
minded him of his father. 

And so, when he saw himself on the road to Rouen on 
Thursday morning, borne along by Graindorge with his 
measured trot, he ifelt his heart lighter, more at peace than 
it had been since his bereavement 

On entering Mademoiselle Donet's apartment, he saw the 
table laid as on the previous Thursday, with the sole differ- 
ence that the crust had not been removed from the bread 
He pressed the young woman's hand, kissed Emile on bodi 
cheeks, and sat down, more or less as if he were in his own 
house, although his heart was full. Mademoiselle Donet 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT U1 

seemed to him a little thmner and paler. She must have 
grieved sorely. She now wore an air of constraint in his 
presence, as if she imderstood what she had not felt the 
week before under the first blow of her misfortune, and she 
exhibited an excessive deference toward him. a mournful hu- 
mility, and made touching efforts to please him, as if to repay 
by her attentions the kindness he had manifested toward her. 
They were a long time at luncheon, talking over the busi- 
ness which had brought him there. She did not want so 
much money. It was too much. She earned enough to live 
on herself, but she only wished that Emile might find a few 
sous awaiting him when he grew up. Wsar was firm, how- 
ever, and even added a gift of a thousand francs for herself, 
iov the expenses of mourning. 

When he had taken his coffee, ^e asked: 

"Do you smoke?" 

"Yes — I have my pipe." 

He felt in his pocket. Good heavens! He had forgotten 
it! He was becoming quite distressed about it when she 
offered him a pipe of his father^s that had been put away in 
a closet. He took it up in his hand, recognized it, smelled 
it, spoke of its quality in a tone of emotion, filled it with 
tobacco, and lighted it. Then, he set Emile astride his 
knee, and gave him a ride, while she removed the table- 
cloth, and piled the soiled dishes under the sideboard, in- 
tending to wash them as soon as he was gone. 

About three o'clock he rose regretfully, quite annoyed at 
the thought of having to go. 

"Well! Mademoiselle Donet," he said, "I wish you good 
evening, and am delighted to have found you like this." 

She remained standing before him, blushing, much affected, 
and gazed at him while she thought of the father. 

"Shall we not see one another again?" she said. 

He replied simply: 

"Why, yes, mademoiselle, if it gives you pleasure." 

"Certainly, Monsieur C6sar. Will next Thursday suit 
you?" 

"Yes, Mademoiselle Donet." 

"You will come to luncheon, of course?" 



248 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"Well — if you are so kind as to invite me, I can't refuse." 
"It is understood, then, Monsieur C^sar — next Thursday, 
at twelve, the same as today." 
"Thursday at twelve, Mademoisdie Donetl" 



THE PIECE OF STRING 

{La Ficelle) 
By GUY DE MAUPASSANT 

ON all the roads about Goderville the peasants and 
their wives were coming towards the town, for it 
was market day. The men walked at easy gait, the 
whole body thrown forward with every movement of thdr 
long, crooked legs, misshapen by hard work, by the bearing 
down on the plough which at the same time causes the left 
shoulder to rise and the figure to slant; by the mowing of 
the grain, which makes one hold his knees apart in order 
to obtain a firm footing; by all the slow and laborious tasks 
of the fields. Their starched blue blouses, glossy as if 
varnished, adorned at the neck and wrists with a bit of 
white stitchwork, puffed out about their bony chests like 
balloons on the point of taking flight, from which protruded 
a head, two arms, and two feet. 

Some of them led a cow or a calf at the end of a rope. 
And their wives, walking behind the beast, lashed it with 
a branch still covered with leaves, to hasten its pace. They 
carried on their arms great baskets, from which heads of 
chickens or of ducks were thrust forth. And they walked 
with a shorter and quicker step than their men, their stiff, 
lean figures wrapped in scanty shawls pinned over their 
flat breasts, their heads enveloped in a white linen cloth dose 
to the hair, with a cap over all. 

Then a char-d-bancs passed, drawn by a jerky-paced nag, 
with two men seated side by side shaking like jelly, and a 

Translated by George Bumham Ives. G)p3rright, 1903, by 
G. P. Putnam's Sons. 

249 



2S0 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

woman behind, who clung to the side of the vehicle to 
lessen the rough jolting. 

On the square at Goderville there was a crowd, a medley 
of men and beasts. The horns of the cattle, the high hats, 
with a long, hairy nap, of the wealthy peasants, and the 
head-dresses of the peasant women, appeared on the surface 
of the throng. And the sharp, ^rill, high-pitched voices 
formed an incessant, uncivilized uproar, over which soared 
at times a roar of laughter from the powerful chest of a 
sturdy yokel, or the prolonged bellow of a cow fastened to 
the wall of a house. 

There was an all-pervading smell of the stable, of milk, 
of the dunghill, of hay, and of perspiration, — that acrid, 
disgusting odour of man and beast peculiar to country 
people. 

Master Hauchecome, of Br&iut6, had just arrived at 
Goderville, and was walking towards the square, when he 
saw a bit of string on the groimd. Master Hauchecome, 
economical like every true Norman, thought that it was 
well to pick up everything that mi^t be of use; and he 
stooped painfidly, for he suffered with rheumatism. He 
took the piece of slender cord from the groimd, and was 
about to roll it up carefully, when he saw Master Malandain, 
the harness-maker, standing in his doorway and looking at 
him. They had formerly had trouble on the subject of a 
halter, and had remained at odds, being both indined to 
bear malice. Master Hauchecome felt a sort of shame at 
being seen thus by his enemy, fumbling in the mud for a 
bit of string. He hurriedly concealed his treasure in his 
blouse, then in his breeches'-pocket; then he pretended to 
look on the ground for something else, which he did not 
find; and finally he went on towards the market, his head 
thrust forward, bent double by his pains. 

He lost himself at once in the slow-moving, shouting 
cn/wd, kept in a state of excitement by the interminable 
bargaining. The peasants felt of the cows, went away, re- 
turned, sorely perplexed, always afraid of being dieaiecl 
never daring to msdsie up thdr minds, watching the vendor^ 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 251 

eye, striving incessantly to detect the tricks of the man and 
the defect in the beast. 

The women, having placed their great baskets at their 
feet, took out their fowls, which lay on the ground, thdr 
legs tied together,' with frightened eyes and scarlet combs. 

They listened to offers, adhered to their prices, short of 
speech and impassive of face; or else, suddenly deciding 
to accept the lower price offered, they would call out to the 
customer as he walked slowly away: 

"All right, Mast' Anthime. You can have it." 

Then, litUe by little, the square became empty, and 
when the Angelus struck midday those who lived too far 
away to go home betook themselves to the various mns. 

At Jourdain's the common room was full of customers, as 
the great yard was full of vehicles of every sort — carts, 
cabriolets, char-it-bancs, tilburys, unnamable carriages, 
shapeless, patched, with their shafts reaching heavenwarti 
like arms, or with their noses in the groimd and thdr taik 
in the air. 

The vast fireplace, full of clear flame, cast an intense hea,% 
against the ba!cks of the row on the right of the table. 
Three spits were revolving, laden with diickens, pigeonSj 
and legs of mutton: and a delectable odour of roast meat, 
and of gravy dripping from the browned skin, came forth 
from the hearth, stirred the guests to merriment, and made 
their mouths water. 

All the aristocracy of the plough ate there, at Mast' 
Jourdain's, the inn-keeper and horse-trader — a shrewd ras- 
cal who had money. 

The dishes passed and were soon emptied, like the jugs 
of yellow cider. Every one told of his affairs, his sales, 
and his purchases. They inquired about the crops. The 
weather was good for green stuffs, but a little wet for wheat. 

Suddenly a drum rolled in the yard, in front of the house. 
In an instant everybody was on his feet, save a few indif- 
ferent ones: and they all ran to the door and windows, with 
their mouths still full and napkins in hand. 

Having finished his long tattoo, the public crier shouted 
in a jerky voice, making his pauses in the wrong places: 



252 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

''The people of Goderville, and all those present at the 
market are informed that between — ^nine and ten o'dock this 
morning on the Beuzevflle — ^road, a black leather wallet was 
lost, containing five hundred — francs, and busmess papen. 
The finder is requested to carry it to — ^the mayor's office 
at once^ or to Master Fortun6 Houlbr^ue of MannevOIe. 
A reward of twenty francs will be paid." , 

Then he went away. They heard once more in the dis- 
tance the muffled roll of the drum and the indistinct voice 
of the crier. 

Then they began to talk about the incident, reckomng 
Master Houlbreque's chance of finding or not finding his 
wallet. 

And the meal went on. 

They were finishing their cofTee when the ootporal of 
gendarmes appeared in the doorway. 

He inquired: 

"Is Master Hauchecome of Br&iut6 here?" 

Master Hauchecome, who was seated at the farther end 
of the table, answered: 

"Here I am." 

And the corporal added: 

"Master Hauchecome, will you be kind enough to go 
to the mayor^s office with me? Monsieur the mayor would 
like to speak to you." 

The peasant, surprised and disturbed, drank his petit 
verre at one swallow, rose, and even more bent than in the 
morning, for the first steps after each rest were particularly 
painful, he started off, repeating: 

"Here I am, here I am." 

And he followed che brigadier. 

The mayor was waiting for him, seated in an arm- 
chair. He was the local notary, a stout, solemn-faced man, 
given to pompous speeches. 

"Master Hauchecome," he said, "you were seen t^s 
moming, on the Beuzeville road, to pidL up the wallet lost 
by Master Houlbrfeque of Manneville." 

The rustic, dumfounded, stared at the mayofi already 



GUY DB MAUPASSANT 253 

alarmed by this su^icion which had fallen upon him, al- 
though he failed to imderstand it. 

"I, I— I picked up that wallet?" 

"Yes, you." 

"On my word of honor, I didn't ever so much as see it" 

"You were seen." 

"They saw me, me? Who was it saw me?" 

"Monsieur Malandain, the harness-maker." 

Thereupon the old man remembered and understood; and 
flushing with anger, he cried: 

"Ah! he saw me, did he, that sneak? He saw me pick 
up this string, look, m'sieu' mayor." 

Adn, fumbling in the depths of his pocket, he produced 
the little piece of cord. 

But the mayor was incredulous and shook his head. 

"You won't make me believe. Master Hauchecome, that 
Monsieur Malandain, who is a man deserving' of credit, 
mistook this string for a wallet." 

The peasant, in a rage, raised his hand, spit to one 
side to pledge his honor, and said: 

"It's God's own truth, the sacred truth, all the same, 
m'sieu' mayor. I say it again, by my soul and my salva- 
tion." 

"After picking it up," rejoined the mayor, "you hunted 
a long while in the mud, to see if some piece of money 
hadn't fallen out." 

The good man was suffocated with wrath and fear. 

"If any one can tell — if any one can tell lies like that, 
to ruin an honest man! If any one can say " 

To no purpose did he protest; he was not believe'^. 

He was confronted with Monsieur Malandain, who re- 
peated and maintained his declaration. They insulted each 
other for a whole hour. At his own request. Master Hp.uche- 
come was searched. They found nothing on him. At 
last the mayor, being sorely perplexed, discharged him, but 
warned him that he proposed to inform the prosecuting at- 
torney's office and to ask for orders. 

The news had spread. On leavmg the mayor's office, 
the old man was s-irrounded and questioned with serious or 



2 54 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

bantering curiosity, in which, however, there was no trace 
of indignation. And he began to tell the story of the 
string. They did not believe him. They laughed. 

He went his way, stopping his acquaintances, repeating 
again and again his story and his protestations, ^wing his 
pockets turned inside out, to prove that he had nothing. 

They said to him: 

**You old rogue, va!" 

And he lost his temper, lashing himself into a rage, fever- 
ish with excitement, desperate because he was not believed, 
at a loss what to do, and still telling his story. 

Nipht came. He must needs go home. He started mih 
three ncipjhbours, to whom he pointed out the place where 
he had picked up the bit of string: and all the way he talked 
of his misadventure. 

During the evening he made the circuit of the village of 
Breautc, in order to tell ever^'body about it. He found 
none but incredulous listeners. 

He was ill over it all night. 

The next afternoon, about one o'clock, Marius Paumdle, 
a farm-hand employed by Master Breton, a farmer of 
Ymauville, restored the wallet and its contents to Master 
Houlbrcque of Manneville. 

The man claimed that he had found it on the road; but, 
being unable to read, he had carried it home and given 
it to his employer. 

Ihe news soon became known in the neighbourhood; 
Master Hauchecome was informed of it. He started out 
again at once, and began to tell his story, now made com- 
plete by the denouement. He was triumphant. 

*'\Vhat made me feel bad," he said, "wasn't so much the 
thing itself, you understand, but the lying. There's nothing 
hurts you so much as being blamed for lymg." 

All day long he talked of his adventure; he told it on 
the roads to people who passed; at the wine-shop to people 
who were drinking; and after church on the following Sun- 
day. He even stopped strangers to tell than about it 
His mind was at rest now, and yet something embarrassed 
him, although he could not say just what it was. People 



GUV DE MAUPASSANT 255 

seemed to laugh while they listened to him. They did not 
seem convinced. He felt as if remarks were made behind 
his back. 

On Tuesday of the next week, he went to market at 
Goderville, impelled solely by the longing to tell his story. 

Makmdain, standing in his doorway, began to laugh when 
he saw him coming. Why? 

He accosted a farmer from Criquetot, who did not let 
him finish, but poked him in the pit of his stomach, and 
shouted in his face: "Go on, you old fox!" Then he 
turned on his heel. 

Master Hauchecome was speechless, and more and more 
disturbed. Why did he call him "old fox"? 

WTien he was seated at the table, in Jourdain's inn, he 
set about explaining the affair once more. 

A horse-trader from Montivilliers called out to him: 

"Nonsense, nonsense, you old dodger! I know all about 
your string!" 

"But they've found the wallet!" faltered Hauchecome. 

"None of that, old boy; there's one who finds it, and 
there's one who carries it back. I don't know just how 
you did it, but I understand you." 

The peasant was fairly stunned. He understood at last. 
He was accused of having sent the wallet back by a con- 
federate, an accomplice. 

He tried to protest. The whole table began to laugh. 

He could not finish his dinner, but left the inn amid a 
chorus of jeers. 

He returned home, shamefaced and indignant, suffocated 
by wrath, by confusion, and all the more cast down be- 
cause, with his- Norman cunning, he was quite capable of 
doing the thing v;ith which he was charged, and even of 
boastini? of it as a shrewd trick. He had a confused idea 
that his innocence was impossible to establish, his crafti- 
ness being so well known. And he was cut to the heart 
by the injustice of the suspicion. 

Thereupon he began once more to tell of the adventure, 
making the story longer each day, adding each time new 
arguments, more forcible protestations, more solemn oaths. 



2S6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

which he devised and prepared in his hours of solitude, his 
mind being wholly engrossed by the story of the string. The 
more complicated his defence ai^d the more subtle his rear 
soning, the less he was believed. 

''Those are a liar's reasons," people said behind his back. 

He realized it; he gnawed his nails, and exhausted himsdf 
in vain efforts. 

He grew perceptibly thinner. 

Now the jokers asked him to tell the story of Tke Piece 
of String for their amusement, as a soldier who has seen 
service is asked to tell about his battles. His mind, at- 
tacked at its source, grew feebler. 

Late in December he took to his bed. 

In the first days of January he died, and in the delirium 
of the death-agony, he protested his innocaicey repeating: 

"A little piece of string — a little piece of 
here it is, m'sieu' mayor." 

1884. 



A QUESTION OF DIPLOMACY 

(Le Coup cf 6tat) 
By GUY DE MAUPASSANT 

NEWS of the disaster of Sedan has just reached Paris. 
The Republic had been proclaimed and the entire 
country gasped at the beginning of the madness which 
lasted until after the Conunune. From one end of the 
land to the other, men played at being soldiers. 

Hat-makers were colonels with the functions of generals; 
revolvers and knives were di^layed about pacific bellies en- 
veloped with red sashes; litUe bourgeois, who had become 
warriors by accident, commanded battalions of bawling vol- 
unteers and swore like truck-drivers to give themselves a 
commanding presence. 

The mere fact of holding arms, of handling automatic 
rifles, distracted these people who had hitherto handled 
only scales, and made them, without reason, redoubtable to 
the first comer. The innocent were executed to prove that 
they knew how to kill; and in prowling about the country 
still undefiled by the Prussians they ^ot the stray dogs, 
the cows ruminating in peace, and sick horses grazing in 
the meadows. 

Everybody considered himself called upon to play a great 
military role. The cafes of the smallest villages, with their 
horde of shopkeepers in imiform, resembled barracks or am- 
bulances. 

The borough of Caneville still ignored the distracting 
news of the army from the capital; but for a month an 

Translated by Giarles Henry White. Copyright, 1917, by 
Harper and Brothers. 

2S7 



2s8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

extreme agitation was shaking it — the rival factions stood 
face to face. 

The mayor, the Viscount de Vametot, a small, thin, little 
man, already old, and a legitimist who for ambitious mo- 
tives had but recently rallied to the Empire, saw a deter- 
mined adversary in the person of Dr. Massard, a fat, florid 
man, chief of the Republic party of the district, an elder 
in the headquarters of the Masonic lodge, president of the 
Society of Agriculture, and organiser of the rural militia, 
which was to save the country. 

In fifteen days he had found the means of persuading 
sixty-three married men — fathers of families — to defend the 
country; these were prudent peasants and tradesmen of the 
borough, and he drilled them every morning in the square 
of the town-hall. 

When the mayor by chance came to the parish building, 
the commandant Massarel, loaded with pistols, passed 
proudly before his troops, saber in hand, and made his 
people shout, ''Vive la patrie!" 

And it was noticed that this cry agitated the little vis- 
count, who doubtless saw in this a threat, a challenge, and 
at the same time an odious reminder of the great Revo- 
lution. 

On the morning of December 5 th, as the postman brought 
the paper, the doctor, in uniform, his revolver on the table, 
was engaged in consultation with a couple of old farmers, 
one of whom had been afflicted with varicose veins for 
seven years, but had waited till his wife also had them be- 
fore consulting a doctor. 

Monsieur Massarel opened the newspaper, turned pale, 
rose suddenly, and, raising his arms to heaven with an ex- 
alted gesture, began to bawl at the top of his voice before 
the two frightened rustics: 

"Long live the Republic! Long live the Republic! 
Long live the Republic!" 

Thn he fell back into an arm-chair, faint with, emotion. 

And as the peasant continued, "It began just like ants 
crawling up and down my legs," the doctor broke in with: 
"Shut up! As if I had time to attend to your drivel I The 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 259 

Republic has been proclaimed; the Emperor is a prisoner; 
France is saved. Long live the Republic!" And, run- 
ning to the door, he cried: "Celeste, qtiickl C61este!" 

llie terror-stricken servant ran up; he talked sa r^i(Hy 
that he sputtered: 

"My boots, my saber, my cartridge-pouch, and the Span- 
ish dagger that is on the table at my bedside. Hurry!" 

And as the obstinate peasant, taJdng advantage of an 
instant of silence again took up the thread of his narra- 
tive, "It became like little pockets that hurt me as I 
walked," the exasperated doctor screamed: "Good God! 
will you shut up! If you had washed your feet this wouldn't 
have happened!" 

Then, seizing him by the collar, he shouted in his face, 
"You glorified ass; don't you realise that we're in a Re- 
public?" 

But professional sentiment calmed him at once and 4ie 
pushed the astounded couple outside, repeating: "Come 
back to-morrow; come back to-morrow my friends. I 
haven^t the time to-day." 

Even while he equipped himself from head to foot he 
again gave a series of orders to his servant: 

"Run to Lieutenant Picart and to Sub-Lieutenant Pom- 
mel and tell them I expect them here immediately. Send 
me Torchebeuf, too, with his drum, quick! Quick!" 

And when Celeste had left he pulled himself together 
preparatory to surmounting the difficulties of the situation. 

The three men arrived together, in working-clothes. The 
commandant, who had expected to see them in uniform, re- 
ceived a shock. 

"The devil! Then you know nothing? The Emperor is 
a prisoner; the Republic has been proclaimed. We must 
act. My position is delicate, I may even say perilous." 
He mused for a few seconds before Ihe astonished faces of 
his subordinates, and continued: "We must act and not 
hesitate. In similar instances minutes are worth hours. 
Everything depends upon the promptness of decisions. You, 
Picart, go and find the priest and order him to ring the 
alarm-bell to assemble the population, whom I am going 



26o THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

to inform. You, Torchd)euf, beat the caU to anns in the 
entire parish as far as the hamlets of Gersaie and Salmaire. 
You, Pommel, dress promptly in your uniform — ^nothing but 
the tunic and the kipi. We will occupy the town-haU to- 
gether and summon Monsieur de Vametot to surrender lus 
executive power to me. Have you understood?^' 

"Yes." 

"Execute this and be prompt I shall accompany you 
as far as your house, Pommel, as we are operating to- 
gether." 

Five minutes later the commandant and his subordinates, 
armed to the teeth, appeared on the square just at the mo* 
ment when the little Viscount de Vametot, with legs gaitered 
as if for a hunting-party, his shot-gun on his shoulder, 
emerged with rapid steps from another street, followed by 
his three guards, in green tunics, their knives at the hip 
and their rifles slung over the shoulder. 

As the doctor stopped, dumfounded, the four men pene- 
trated into the town-hall, the door of which dosed after 
them. 

"We have been forestalled," muttered the doctbr. "Wc 
must now wait for reinforcements. There's nothmg to be 
done for a quarter of an hour." 

Lieutenant Picart reappeared. "The priest has refused 
to obey," he said. "He has even locked himself in Ihe 
church with the beadle and the Swiss." 

And from the other side of the square, opposite the white 
and sealed town-hall, the church, mute and gloomy, showd 
its great door of oak, fortified with iron mountings. 

Then, as the perplexed inhabitants put their noses to the 
windows or £^peared on the thresholds of the houses^ the 
drum suddenly rolled and Torchebeuf £^peared, beadng with 
fury the three precipitated beats of the call to arms. He 
crossed the square at quick march and thra disappeared in 
the road leading to the fields. 

Then the commandant drew his saber and advanced to 
about half the distance between the two buildings where 
the enemy had barricaded himself; then, waving his weapon 
above his head, he bellowed with all the force of his lungs: 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 261 

"Long live the Republic I Death to the traitors I" Then 
he returned to his officers. 

The butcher, the baker, and the druggist, uneasy, hung 
up their shutters and closed their shops. Only the grocer 
remained open. 

Yet little by little the men of the militia arrived, diversely 
dressed and all capped with the black Mpi and a red stripe, 
the kipi constituting the uniform of the corps. They were 
armed with old, rusty guns, those old guns that had hung for 
thirty years above the mantelpieces of kitchens, and they 
greatly resembled a detachment of rural constables. 

When he had about thirty around him, the commandant 
in a few words put them in touch with events. Then, turning 
to his general staff, he said, "Now let us act." 

The inhabitants collected, stared, and gaped. 

The doctor had soon devised a plan of action. "Lieu- 
tenant Picart, you will advance beneath the windows of the 
town hall and summom Monsieur de Vametot, in the name 
of the Republic, to surrender the town-hall to me." 

But the lieutenant, a master mason, refused. "You cer- 
tainly are a foxy one. To have me get plugged with a 
bullet. Thanks. You know those fellows in there are 
good shots. Run your own errands." 

The commandant reddened. "I order you to go in the 
name of disipline." 

The lieutenant openly revolted. "Youll order me oftener 
than I'll go to get my face smashed without knowing why." 

The notables, assembled in a neighbouring group, began to 
laugh, and one of them cried: "You right, Picart. This 
isn't the time to do it." 

"Cowards!" muttered the doctor, and, leaving his saber 
and revolver in the hands of a soldier, he advanced at a slow 
pace, his eyes fixed on the windows, expecting to see a rifle 
come out of them, aimed at him. When he was only a few 
steps from the building the doors at either end, which gave 
access to the two schools, opened, and there issued a troop 
of little urchins — boys and girls — who began to play in the 
deserted square and squabbled like a flock of geese about 
the doctor, who could not make himself heard. 



262 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

As soon as the last pupils left, the doors dosed. The 
main body of the youngsters at last dispersed and the com- 
mandant called in a strong voice: 

"Monsieur de Vametot!" 

A window on the first floor opened. Monsieur de Var- 
netot appeared. 

The commandant continued: "Monsieur, you know that 
great events have altered the aspects of the government. 
That which you represented has ceased to be. That nrfiich 
I represent has come into power. Under these unhappy 
but decisive circumstances I have come to summon you in 
the name of the Republic to surrender to me the functions 
you were invested \vith by the preceding powers." 

Monsieur de Vametot replied: "Monsieur le docteur, I 
am mayor of Caneville, elected by competent authority, and 
I shall remain mayor of Caneville as long as I have not been 
dismissed or replaced by an order of my superiors. As 
mayor I am at home in the town-hall, and there I remsun. 
Moreover, try to make me leave it!" And he closed the 
window. 

The commandant turned to his troops. But before ven- 
turing an explanation he eyed Lieutenant Picart from head 
to foot. "You Ye a brave fellow, you are. A famous milk- 
sop — the disgrace of the army. I degrade you from your 
rank." 

*'As if T give a damn," the lieutenant answered; and he 
went away to mingle with the murmuring group of inhabi- 
tants. 

The doctor hesitated. What was he to do? Order an 
attack? But would the men charge? Then, again, had he 
the authority? An idea occurred to him. He ran to the 
telegraph-office, which faced the town-hall on the other side 
of the square, and sent off three despatches: to the lord- 
mayor of the republican government at Paris, to the prefect 
of the Seine Inferieure at Rouen, to the new republican 
sub-prefect of Dieppe. 

He set forth the situation; dwelt on the danger incurred 
by the parish remaining in the hands of a former monarchist 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 263 

mayor, offered his devoted services, asked for orders, and 
signed his name, following it with all his titles. 

Then, taking ten francs from his pocket, he returned to 
his army corps. "Here, my friends, go and eat and have a 
drink, and leave only a detachment of ten men here so that 
nobody can leave the town-hall." 

But ex-Lieutenant Picart, who was peaking with the 
watchmaker, heard, and began to chuckle: 

"By gad! if they leave, that'll be the chance to enter. 
Unless they do I can't see you inside there." 

The doctor did not answer, and went to limch. In the 
afternoon he stationed pickets aroimd the entire parish as 
if it were threatened by an attack. He passed Sjeveral times 
before the doors of the town-hall and the church without 
noticing anything suspicious. One might have thought these 
buildings empty. 

The butcher, the baker, and the druggist opened their 
shops. 

Newsmongers prattled in the lodging-houses. If the Em- 
peror was a prisoner there was treaichery somewhere. They 
did not know which republic had returned. 

Night fell. Toward nine o'clock the doctor noiselessly 
approached the entrance of the district building alone, per- 
suaded that his adversary had left to go to bed, and as he 
was preparing to break in the door with a pickaxe a loud 
voice the voice of a guard suddenly demanded: 

"Who's there?" 

And Monsieur Massarel beat a retreat as fast as his 
legs would carry him. 

Davbreak found the situation unaltered. The militia 
in arms occupied the square. All the inhabitants had united 
about these troops, awaiting a solution, and from neighbour- 
ing villages others began to arrive to see the sights. 

The doctor, realising that his reputation was at stake, 
resolved to finish things in one way or another; and he 
was about to come to some kind of a resolution — an ener- 
getic one, assuredly — when the door of the telegraph-office 
opened and the little servant of the directress appeared, hold- 
ing two papers in her hand. 



264 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

At first she made for the commandant and handed hnn 
one of the despatches; then, crossing the deserted middle of 
the square, intimidated by all the eyes fixed on her, she 
went vnth mincing steps and bowed head to rap lightly on 
the barricaded door of the town-hall, as if she were ignorast 
that an armed faction was hiding there. 

The door opened; the hand of a man received the mes- 
sage, and the young girl returned, all flushed and ready to 
cry for having been stared at by the entire country. 

The doctor in a vibrating voice demanded, "A little si- 
lence if you please!" And when the populace had become 
silent he proudly began: ''Here is the commimication I have 
received from the government." And lifting his voice he 
read: 

^* 'The mayor is dismissed. Kindly ad^dse at earliest pos- 
fuble moment. Will receive later instructions. 

" Tor the sub-prefect, 

" 'Sapin, Comicnor.' " 

He had triumphed. His heart beat ^th joy; his hands 
trembled; but Picart, his former subordinate, called to him 
from a neighbouring group: 

''That is all very well so far, but the Others haven't Idt, 
and your paper makes you look funny." 

Monsieur Massarel turned pale. If the others did not 
leave it was certain that he would have to advance. It was 
not only his rip;ht, but his duty. And he looked anxiously 
to the town-hall, hoping to see the door open and his ad- 
versary withdraw. 

The door remained closed. What should he do? The 
crowd increased and closed in about the militia. They be- 
gan to laugh. 

One thought, above all, tortured the doctor. If he or 
dered an attack it would be necessary to march at the hod 
of his men; and as with his death all controversy would 
cease, it would be at him that Moirsieur de Vametot and Us 
three guards would shoot. And they were good shots, voy 
good — Picart had just repeated this to him. He turned to 
Ponunel, for an idea had illimiinated him: 



GUY DE MAUPASSANT 265 

''Go quick and ask the druggist to lend me a napkin and 
a stick." 

The lieutenant hurried. 

He was going to make a flag of truce — ^a white flag, the 
sight of which might gladden the former mayor. 

Pommel returned with the requested linen and a broom- 
handle. With pieces of string this standard was devised, 
which Monsieur Massarel seized with both hands and again 
advanced toward the town-hall, holding it before him. 

When he was opposite the door he again called, '^Mon- 
sieur de Vametot." 

The door suddenly opened and Monsieur de Vametot 
appeared on the threshold with his three guards. 

The doctor recoiled with an instinctive movement; then, 
saluting his enemy with courtesy, and strangled by emotion, 
he began: "I come, monsieur, to communicate to you the 
instructions I have received." 

The viscount, without returning his salute, replied, "I 
withdraw, monsieur, but rest assured that it is neither from 
fear nor from obedience to the odious government which has 
usurped power." And, emphasising each word, he declared: 
"I do not wish to appear to be serving the Republic for a 
single day. That is all." 

Massarel, speechless, did not reply, and Monsieur de 
Vametot, dropping into a brisk pace, ^sappeared in a cox 
ner of the square, still followed by his escort. 

Then the doctor, bewildered with pride, retumed toward 
the crowd. As sooir as he was near enough to make himself 
heard he cried: "Hurrah! Hurrah 1 The Rq>ublic 
triumphs all along the line!" 

No emotion was manifested. 

The doctor continued: "The people are free; you are free, 
independent. Be proud ! " 

The inert villagers stared at him without a glimmer of 
pride in their eyes. 

It was his tum to siurvey them, disgusted at their in- 
difference, and to search for something he might say which 
would be the means of striking a great blow, of electrifying 



266 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

the pacific country and of fulfilling his mission of the in- 
itiator. 

But an inspiration came to him, and, tummg to Pommd, 
he said, ^'Lieutenant, go and find the bust of the ex-£mperor 
which is in the debating-room of the Municipal CouncO, 
and bring it to me with a chair." 

The man soon reappeared, carrying on his ri^t shoulder 
a Bonaparte of plaster and holding in his left hand a straw- 
bottomed chair. 

Monsieur Massarel went forward to meet him, took the 
chair, put it on the ground, placed the bust upon it, and, 
retreating for a few paces, addressed it in a sonorous voice: 

"Tyrant! tyrant! Here you are fallen — fallen in the dirt 
— fallen in the mire! The expiring fatherland gasped under 
your heel! Avenging Destiny has struck you I Defeat and 
shame cling to you! You fall vanquished, a pris(»ier of the 
Prussians, and on the ruins of your crumbling onpire thi? 
young and radiant Republic, taking up your broken sword, 

He awaited the applause. Not a cry, no clapping of 
hands burst forth. The bewildered peasants were silent, 
and the bust with the mustache extending past the cheeks 
on either side, the immovable bust, well-groomed like a 
hairdresser's sign, seemed to look at Monsieur Massarel with 
its smile of plaster — an ineffaceable and mocking smile. 

Thus they stood face to face — Napoleon on his chair and 
the doctor standing at three paces from him. The command- 
ant was seized with anger. What was he to do to move these 
stolid people and to definitely win this victory of opinion? 

His hand, by chance, wandered to his stomach and en- 
countered the butt of his revolver. Words of inspiration 
came to him no more. He drew the weapon, took two steps, 
aiKl, point-blank, fired at the deposed monarch. 

The ball drilled a small, black hole in the forehead like 
a spot — ^hardly anything. He had missed his effect. Mon- 
sieur Massarel took a second shot, which made a second 
hole, then a third, and, without stopping, he let go the rest 

The forehead of Napoleon flew into white dust, but the 



GUY DB MAUPASSANT 267 

eyes, the nose, and the fine points of the mustache remained 
intact. 

In exasperation the doctor overturned the chair with a 
punch, and, placing his foot on the remains of the bust in 
the posture of a conqueror, he turned to the astounded 
public. "Let all traitors peri^ thusl " But as no enthusiasm 
had yet manifested itself, and as the spectators seemed to 
be stupid with astonishment, the commandant called to 
the men of the militia, "You may now return to yoor 
homes." And he himself made for his own home as if pur* 
sued. 

His servant, as soon as he appeaiedf told him that some 
patients had been waiting for more than three hours in his 
office, and he hurried in. 

They were the two peasants with the varicose veins^ 
who had returned just after dawn, obstinate and patient 

And the old man at once began his explanation: ''It be- 
gan just like ants crawling up acid down my legs. • • •" 



SAC-AU-DOS 

(Sac-au-dos) 
By JORIS-KARL HUYSMANS 

AS soon as I finished my ^studies my parents deemed it 
useful to my career to "cause me to appear before a 
table covered with green doth and surmounted by the 
living busts of some old gentleman who interested them- 
selves in knowing whether I had learned enoufiji of t:.c dead 
languages to entitle me to the degree of Bachelor. 

The test was satisfactory. A dinner to which all :ny re- 
lations, far and near, were invited, celebrate'* my succe?3, 
affected my future, and ultimately fixed me in the law. 
Well, I passed my examination and got rid of the money 
paovided for my first year's expenses with a blonoe girl ^dio, 
at times, pretended to be fond of me. 

I frequented the Latin Quarter assiduously and there I 
learned many things; among others to take an interest in 
those students who blew their political opinions into the 
foam of their beer, every night, then to acquire a taste for 
the works of George Sand and of Heine, of Edgard Quinet, 
and of Henri Mlirger. 

The psychophysical moment of silliness was upon me. 

That lasted about a year; gradually I ripened. The dec- 
toral struggles of the closing days of the Empure Irft me 
cold; I was the son neither of a Senator nor a proscript 
and I had but to outlive, no matter what the regime, the 
traditions of mediocrity and wretchedness long since 
adopted by my family. The law pleased me but little. I 

Translated by L. G. Meyer. Copyright, 1907, by P. F. Collier 
& Son. 

168 



JORIS'KARL HUYSMANS 269 

thought that the Code had been purposely malduected in 
order to furnish certam people with an oi^rtunity to 
wrangle, to the utmost limit, over the smaUest words; even 
to-day it seems to me that a phrase dearly worded can not 
reasonably bear such diverse interpretation. 

I was sounding my depths, searching for some state of 
being that I might embrace without too much disgust, when 
the late Emperor foimd one for me; he made me a soldier 
through the maladroitness of his policy. 

The war with Prussia broke out To tell the truth I did 
not understand the motives that made that butchery of 
armies necessary. I felt neither the need of kflling others 
nor of being killed by them. However that may be, enrolled 
in the Garde mobile of the Seme, I received orders, after 
having gone in search of an outfit, to visit the barber and 
to be at the barracks in the Rue Lourdne at seven o'dodL 
in the evening. 

I was at the place punctually. After roU-call part of the 
regiment swarmed out of the barradc gates and enq>tied 
into the street. Then the sidewalks raised a shout and the 
gutters ran. 

Crowding one against another, workmen in blouses, work- 
men in tatters, soldiers strapped and gaitered, witibout arms, 
they scanned to the clink of glasses the Marsdllaise over 
which they shouted theDiselves hoarse with thdr voices out 
of time. Heads geared with k6pis* of incredible hdght and 
ornamented with vizors fit for blind men and with tin cock- 
ades of red, white and blue, mufSed in blue-black jadcets 
with madder-red collars and cuffs, breached in blue linen 
pantaloons with a red stripe down the side, the militia of 
the Seine kept howling at the moon before going forth to 
conquer Prussia. That was a deafening uproar at the whie 
shops, a hubbub of glasses, cans and ^rieks, cut into here 
and there by the rattling of a window shaken by the wmd. 
Suddenly the roll of the drum muffled all that damor; a 
new column poured out of the barracks; there was carous- 
ing and tippling indescribable. Those soldiers who were 
drinking in the wine shops shot now out into the streets, 

* Military hats. 



270 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

followed by their parents and friends who disputed the honor 
of carrying their knapsacks; the ranks were broken; it was 
a confusion of soldiers and citizens; mothers wept, fathers, 
more contained, sputtered wine, diildren frisked for joy 
and shrieked patriotic songs at the top of their shrill voices. 

They crossed Paris helter-skelter by the flashes of lig^t- 
ning that whipped the storming clouds into white zigzags. 
The heat was overpowering, the knapsack was heavy; they 
draak at every comer of the street; they arrived at last at 
the railway station of Aubervilliers. There was a moment 
of silence broken by the sound of sobbing, dominated again 
by a burst of the Marseillaise, then they stalled us like cat- 
tle in the cars. '^Good night, Jules! may we meet soon 
again! Be good! Above all write to me I" They squeezed 
hands for a last time, the train whistled, we had left die sta- 
tion. We were a regular shovelful of fifty men in that box 
that rolled away with us. Some were weeping freely, jeered 
at by the others who, completely lost in drink, were stick- 
ing Ughted candles into their provisions and bawling at the 
top of their voices: "Down with Badinguetl and long Kve 
Rochefort!"* 

Others, in a comer by themselves, stared silently and sul- 
lenly at the broad floor that kept vibrating in the dust All 
at once the convoy makes a halt — I got out Complete 
darkness — twenty-five minutes after midnight. 

On all sides stretch the fields, and in the distance lighted 
up by sharp flashes of lightning, a cottage, a tree sketch 
their silhouette against a sky swollen by the tempest. Only 
the grinding and mmbling of the engine is heard, whose 
clusters of sparks flying from the smokestack scatter like a 
bouquet of fireworks the whole length of the train. Every 
one gets out, goes forward as far as the engine, which looms 
up in the night and becomes huge. The stop lasted quite 
two hours. The signal disks flamed red, the engineer was 
waiting for them to reverse. They tum; again we get back 
into the wagons, but a man who comes up on the run and 
swinging a lantern, speaks a few words to the omduttor, 

*Badinguet, nickname given to Napoleon III; Henri Rocllt* 
fort, anti-Napoleon journalist and agitator. 



JORIS'KARL HUYSMANS 271 

who immediatdy backs the train into a siding where we 
remain motionless. Not one of us knows where we are. 
I descend again from the carriage, and sitting on an em- 
ban^ent, I nibble at a bit of bread and drir^ a drop or 
two, when the whirl of a hurricane whistles in the distance, 
approaches, roaring and vomiting fire, and an interminable 
train of artillery passed at full speed, carrying along horses, 
men, and cannon whose bronze necks sparkle in a confusion 
of light. Five minutes after we take up our slow advance, 
again interrupted by halts that grow longer and longer. The 
journey ends with daybreak, and leaning from the car win- 
dow, worn out by the long watch of the night, I look out 
up)on the country that surrounds us: a succession of chalky 
plains, closing in the horizon, a band of pale green like the 
colour of a sick turquoise, a flat cotmtry, gloomy, meagre, the 
beggarly Champagne Pouilleuse! 

Little by little the sun brightens, we, rumbling on the 
while, end, however, by getting there! Leaving at ei^t 
o'clock in the evening, we were delivered at three o'(;|Iock 
of the afternoon of the next day. Two of the militia had 
dropped by the Vv^ay, one who had taken a header from the 
top of the car into the river, the other who had broken his 
head on the ledge of a bridge. The rest, after having pil- 
laged the hovels and the gardens, met along the route wher- 
ever the train stopped, either yawned, their lips puffed out 
with wine, and their eyes swollen, or amused themselves by 
throwing from one side of the carriage to the other, branches 
of shrubs and hen-coops which they had stolen. 

The disembarldng was managed after the same fashion as 
the departure. Nothing was ready; neither canteen, nor 
straw, nor coats, nor arms, nothing, absolutely nothing. 
Only tents full of manure and of insects, just left by the 
troops off for the frontier. For three days we live at the 
mercy of Mourmelon.* Eating a sausage one day and drink- 
ing a bowl of caf6-au-lait the next, exploited to the utmost 
by the natives, sleeping, no matter how, without straw and 
without covering. Tn2y such a life was not calculated to 
give us a taste for the calling they had inflicted on us. 

♦A suburb of Qialons. 



272 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Once in camp, the companies separated; the labourers took 
themselves to the tents of their fellows; the bourgeois did the 
same. The tent in which I found myself was not badly 
managed, for we succeeded in driving out by argument of 
wine the two fellows, the native odour of whose feet \nfas ag- 
gravated by a long and happy neglect. 

One or two days passed. They made us mount guard 
with the pickets, we drank a great deal of eau-de-vie, and 
the drink-shops of Mourmelon were full without let, when 
suddenly Canrobert'*' passed us in review along the front 
line of battle. I see him now on his big horse, bent over 
the saddle, his hair flying, his waxed mustaches in a ghastly 
face. A mutiny was breaking out. Deprived of everything, 
and hardly convinced by that marshal that we lacked noth- 
ing, we growled in chorus when he talked of repressing our 
complaints by force: ^'Ran, plan, plan, a hundred thousand 
men afoot, to Paris, to Paris!" 

Canrobert grew livid, and shouted, planting his horse in 
the midst of us. '^Hats off to a marshal of Francel" Agdn 
a howl goes up from the ranks; then turning bridle, fol- 
lowed in confusion by his staff officers, he threatened us 
his finger, whistling between his separated teeth. "You 
shall pay dear for this, gentlemen from Paris!" 

Two days after this episode, the icy water of the camp 
made me so sick that there was urgent need of my entering 
the hospital. After the doctor's visit, I buckle on my knap- 
sack, and imder guard of a corporal, here I am going limp- 
ing along, dragging my legs and sweating under my harness. 
The hospital is gorged with men; they send me back. I 
then go to one of the nearest military hospitals; a bed stands 
empty; I am admitted. I put down my knapsack at last, 
and with the expectation that the major would forbid me to 
move, I went out for a walk m the little garden which con- 
nected the set of buildings. Suddenly there issued from 
the door a man with bristling beard and bulging eyes. He 
plants his hands in the pockets of a long dirt-brown doak, 
and shouts out from the distance as soon as he sees me: 

* Canrobert, a brave and distinguished veteran, head of the 
^«xth Corps of the Army of the Rhine. 



JOBJS-KARL HVYSMANS 373 

''Hey you, man I What are you doing over here?'' I 
ai^roach, I explain to him the motive that brings me. He 
thrashes his arms about and bawls: 

''Go in againi You have no ri^t to walk about in ttab 
garden until they give you yotu: costume." 

I go back into the room, a nurse arrives and brings me 
a great military coat, pantaloons, old shoes without beds, 
and a cap like a nightcap. I look at myself, thus grotesquely 
dressed, in my little mirror. Good Heavens, what a face and 
what an outfit! With my haggard eyes and my sallow com- 
plexion, with my hair cut short, and my nose with the bumps 
shining; with my long mouse-gray coat, my pants stained 
russet, my great heelless shoes, my colossal cotton cap, I am 
procUgiously ugly. I could not keep from laughing. I turn 
my head toward the side of my bed neighbour, a tkn boy of 
Jewish type, who is sketching my portrait in a notebook. 
We become friends at once; I tell him to call me Eughie 
Lejantel; he responds by telling me to call him Frauds Em- 
onot; we recall to each other this and that painter; we enter 
into a discussion of esthetics and forget our misfortune. 
Night arrives; they portion out to us a dish of boiled meat 
dotted*black with a few lentils, they pour us out brimming 
cups of coco-dairet, and I undress, endianted at stretching 
myself out in a bed without keeping my dothes and my 
shoes on. 

The next morning I am awakened at about six o'clock 
by a great fracas at the door and a clatter of voices. I sit 
up in bed, I rub my eyes, and I see the gentleman of the 
night before, still dressed in his wrapper, brown the colotu: 
of cachou, who advances majestically, followed by a train 
of nurses. It was the major. Scarcely inside, he rolls his 
dull green eyes from right to left and from left to right, 
plunges his hands in his podiets and bawls: 

"Number One, show your leg — ^your dirty leg. Eh, it's 
in a bad shape, that leg, that sore runs like a fountain; 
lotion of bran and water, lint, half-rations, a strong licorici 
tea. Number Two, show your throat — ^your dirty throat. 
It's getting worse and worse, that throat; the tonsib win bo 
cut out to-morrow." 



274 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"But, doctor " 

"£h, I am not asking an}rthing from you, am I? Say 
one word and I'll put you on a diet." 

"But, at least " 

"Put that man on a diet. Write: diet, gargles, strong 
licorice tea." 

In that vein he passed all the sick in review, prescribing 
for all, the syphilitics and the wounded, the fevered and 
the dysentery patients his strong licorice tea. He stopped 
in front of me, stared into my face, tore off my covering, 
pimched my stomach with his fist^ ordered albiuninated 
water for me, the inevitable tea; and went out snorting and 
dragging his feet. 

Life was difficult with the men who were about us. There 
were twenty-one in our sleeping quarters. At my left slq)t 
my friend, the painter; on my right, a great devil of a 
trumpeter, with face pocked like a sewing thimble and yel- 
low as a glass of biie. He combined two professions, that 
of cobbler by day and a procurer of girls by night. He was, 
in other respects, a comical fellow who frisked about on 
his hands, or on his head, telling you in the most naive way 
in the world the manner in which he expedited at the toe of 
his boot the work of his menials, or intoned in a touching 
voice sentimental songs: 

"I have cherished in my sorrow— ow 
But the friendship of a swallow — ow." 

I conquered his good graces by ^ving him twenty sous 
to buy a liter of wine witn, and we did well in not bdng on 
bad terms with him, for the rest of our quarters — composed 
in part of attorneys of the Rue Maubu6e — ^were well di4>osed 
to pick a quarrel with us. 

One night, among others, the 15th of August, Francis 
Emonot threatened to box the ears of two men who bad 
taken his towel. There was a formidable hubbub in the 
dormitory. Insults rained, we were treated to "roule-en- 
coule et de duchesses." Being two against nineteen, we 
were in a fair way of getting a regular drubbing, when the 



JORIS'KARL HUYSMANS ays 

btig^er interfered, took adde the most despeiaXe and ooaaed 
them into giving up the stolen object To celd>mte the 
reconciliation which followed this scene, Franci9 and I con- 
tributed three francs each, and it was arranged that the 
bugler with the aid of his comrades should try to slip out of 
the hospital and bring back some meat and wine. 

The light had disappeared from the major's window, the 
druggist at last extinguished his, we climb over the thicket, 
examine oiu: surroimd^gs, caution the men who are gliding 
along the walls not to encoimter the sentinels on the way, 
mount on one another's shoulders and jump off into the field. 
An hour later they came back laden with victuals; they pass 
them over and reenter the dormitory with us; we suitress 
the two night lamps, light candle-ends stuck on the floor, 
and aroimd my bed in our shirts we form a drde. We had 
absorbed three or four liters of wine and cut up the best 
part of a leg of mutton, when a great clattering of shoes is 
heard; I blow out the candle stubs, by the grace of my 
shoe, and every one esc^)es imder the beds. The door 
opens; the major appears, heaves a formidable "Good 
Heavens!" stumbles in the darkness, goes out and comes 
back with a lantern and the inevitable train of nurses. I 
profit by the moment to disperse the remains of the feast; 
the major crosses the dormitory at a quick step, swearing, 
threatening to take us all into custody and to put us in 
stocks. 

We are convulsed with laughter imder our coverings; a 
trumpet-flourish blazes from the other side of the dormitory. 
The major puts us all under diet; then he goes out, warning 
us that we shall know in a few minutes what metal he is 
made of. ^ 

Once gone, we vie with each other in doing oiur worst; 
flashes of laughter rumble and crackle. The trumpeter does 
a handspring in the dormitory, one of his friends joins him, 
a third jumps on his bed as on a springboard and boimces 
up and down, his arms balancing, his shirt fl3dng; his neigh- 
bour breaks into a triumphant cancan; the major enters 
abruptly, orders four men of the line he has brou^t with 
him to seize the dancers, and announces to us that lie is 



276 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

going to draw up a report and send it to whom it may con- 
cem. 

Calm is restored at last; the next day we get the nurses 
to buy us some eatables. The days run on without further 
incident. We are beginning to perish of ennui in this hos- 
pital, when, one day, at five o'dock, the doctor bursts into 
the room and orders us to put on our campaign dothes and 
to buckle on our knapsacks. 

We learn ten minutes later that the Prus^ans are march- 
ing on Chalons. 

A gloomy amazement reigns in the quarters. Until now 
we have had no doubts as to the outcome of pas^ng events. 
We knew about the too celebrated victory of Sarrebriick, 
we do not expect the reverses which overwhelm us. The 
major examines every man; not one is cured, all had been 
too long gorged with licorice water and deprived of care. 
Nevertheless, he returns to their corps the least sick, he or- 
ders others to lie down completely dressed, knapsacks in 
readiness. Francis and I are among these last. The day 
passes, the night passes. Nothing. But I have the colic 
contmually and suffer. At last, at about nine o'dock in the 
morning, appears a long train of mules with "cacolets,"* 
and led by "tringlots."t We climb two by two into the 
baskets. Francis and I were lifted onto the same mule, 
only, as the painter was very fat and I very lean, the ar- 
rangement see-sawed; I go up in the air while he descends 
under the belly of the mule, who, dragged by the head, and 
pushed from behind, dances and flings about furiously. We 
trot along in a whirlwind of dust, blinded, bewildered, jolted, 
we cling to the bar of the cacolet, shut our eyes, lau^ and 
groan. We arrive at Chalons more dead than alive; we fall 
to the gravel like jaded cattle, then they pack us into the 
cars and we leave Chalons to go — ^where? No one knows. 

It is night; we fly over the rails. The sick are taken from 
the cars and walked up and down the platforms. The en^ne 
whistles, slows down and stops in a railway station — ^that 

*Panier seats used in the French army to transport the 
wounded. 
tTringlots are the soldiers detailed for this duty. 



JORISKARL HUYSMANS 277 

of Reims, I sui^se, but I can not be sure. We are dlying 
of hunger, the commissary forgot but one thing: to g^e ns 
bread for the journey. I got out. I see an open buffet I 
run for it, but others are Siere before me. They are fight- 
ing as I come up. Some were seizint; bottles, others meat, 
some bread, some cigars. Half-dazed but furknis, iht 
restaurant-keeper defends his shop at the point of a qpit 
Crowded by their comrades, who come up in gangs, the fitnit 
row of militia throw themselves onto the counter, vAddi gives 
way, carrying in its wake the owner of the buffet and his 
waiters. Then followed a regular pillage; everythmg went, 
from matches to toothpicks. Meanwhile the bdl rin^ and 
the train starts. Not one of us disturbs himself, and whQe 
sitting on the walk, I explam to the painter how the tid)e9 
work, the mechanism of the bell. The train backs down over 
the rails to take us aboard. We ascend into oiur compart- 
ments again, and we pass m review the booty we had sdzed 
To tell the truth, there was little variety of food. Pork- 
butchers' meat and nothing but pork-butcher's meat! We 
had six strings of Bologna sausages flavoured with garlic, a 
scarlet tongue, two sausages, a superb slice of ItalUm 
sausage, a slice in silver stripe, the meat all of an angry red, 
mottled white; four liters of wine, a half-bottle of cognac, 
and a few candle ends. We stick the candle ends into the 
neck of our flasks, which swing, hung by strings to the sides 
of the wagon. There was, thus, when the train jolted over a 
switch, a rain of hot grease which congealed almost instantTy 
into great platters, but our coats had seen many another. 
We hef^an our repast at once, interrupted by the going 
and coming of those of the militia who keot running along 
the footboards the whole length of the train, and blocked 
at our window-panes and demanded something to drink. We 
sang at the too of oiur voices, we drank, we clinked passes. 
Never did sick r^en rnake so much noise or romn so on a 
Court of Miracles; the cripples jumped with jomted legs, 
those whose intestines were burning soaked them in bump- 
ers of cop:nac, the one-eyed opened their eyes, the fevered 
capered about, the ^ck throats bellowed and tij^led; ft 
was unheard of! 



278 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

This disturbance ends in calming itself. I profit by the 
lull to put my nose out of the window. There was not a 
star there, not even a tip of the moon; heaven and earth 
seem to make but one, and in that intensity of inky black- 
ness, the lanterns winked like eyes of different colours at- 
tached to the metal of the disks. The engineer discharged 
his whistle, the engine puffed and vomited its sparks with- 
out rest. I reclose the window and look at my companions. 
Some were snoring, others disturbed by the jolting of the 
box, gurgled and swore in their sleep, turning over inces- 
santly, searching for room to stretch their legs, to brace 
their heads that nodded at every jolt. 

By dint of looking at them, I was beguming to get sleepy 
when the train stopped short and woke me up. We were 
at a station; and the station-master's office flamed like a 
forge fire in the darkness of the night. I had one leg 
numbed, I was shivering from cold, I descend to warm up 
a bit. I walk up and down the platform, I go to look at 
the engine, whidi they imcouple, and which they replace 
by another, and walking by the office I hear the bills and 
the tic-tac of the telegraph. The employee, with back 
turned to me, was stooping a little to the right in such a 
way that from where I was placed, I could see but the back 
of his head and the tip of his nose, which shone red and 
beaded with sweat, while the rest of his figure disappeaietf 
in the shadow thrown by the screen of a gas-jet. 

• They invite me to get back into the carriage, and I find 
my comrades again, just as I had left them. That time 1 
went to sleep for good. For how long did my sleep last? 
I don't know — when a great cry woke me up: "Paris! 
Paris!" I made a dash for the doorway. At a distance, 
against a band of pale gold, stood out in black the smote* 
stacks of factories and workshops. We were at Samt-Denis; 
the news ran from car to car. Every one was on his feet 
The engine quickened its pace. The Gare du Nord looms 
up in the distance. We arrive there, we get down, wc 
throw ourselves at the gates. One part of us succeeds in 
escaping, the others are stopped by the employees of the 
railroad and by the troops; by force they make us remount 



JORIS-KARL HUYSMANS 279 

into a train that is getting up steam, and here we are again, 
o£f for God knows where! 

We roll onward again all day long. I am weary of look- 
ing at the rows of houses and trees that ^in by before my 
eyes; then, too, I have the colic continually and I suffer. 
About four o'do<^ of the afternoon, the engine slackens its 
^^eed, and stops at a landing-stage where awaits us there 
an old general, around whom ^x)rts a flock of young men, 
with headgear of red k^pis, br^u±ed in red and shod with 
boots with yellow ^urs. The general passes us in review 
and divides us into two squads; the one for the seminary, 
the other is directed toward the hospital. We are, it se^ns, 
at Arras. Francis and I form part of the first squad. 
They tumble us into carts stuffed with straw, and we arrive 
in front of a great building that setdes and seems about to 
collapse into the street. We moimt to ihe second story to 
a room that contains some thirty beds; each one of us un- 
buckles his knapsack, combs himsdf, and sits down. A doc- 
tor arrives. 

''What is the trouble with you?" he asks of the first 

"A carbimcle." 

"Ah I and you?" 

"Dysentery." 

"Ah I and you?" 

"A bubo." 

"But in that case you have not been wounded during the 
war?" 

"Not the least in the world." 

"Very well! You can take up yoiu: knapsacks again. 
The archbishop gives up the beds of his seminarists only to 
the wounded." 

I pack into my knapsack again all the knick-knacks that 
I had taken out, and we are off again, willy-nilly, for the 
dty hospital. There was no more room &ere. In vain the 
sisters contrive to squeeze the iron beds together, the wards 
are full. Worn out by all these delays, I seize one mattress, 
Francis takes another, and we go and stretch ourselves in 
the garden on a great grass-plot 

The next day I have a talk with the director, an affaUe 



28o THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

and charming man. I ask permission for the painter and 
for me to go out into the town. He consents; the door 
opens; we are free! We are going to dine at lastl To eat 
real meat, to drink real winel Ah, we do not hesitate; we 
make straight for the best hotel in town. They serve us 
there with a wholesome meal. There are flowers ihere on 
the table, magnificent bouquets of roses and fuchias that 
spread themselves out of the glass vases. The waiter brings 
in a roast that drains into a lake of butter; the sun himself 
comes to the feast, makes the covers sparkle and the blades 
of the knives, sifts his golden dust through the carafes, and 
playing with the pommard that gently rocks in the glasses, 
spots with a ruby star the dama^ cloth. 

Oh, sacred joy of the guzzlers! My mouth is full and 
Francis is drunk! The fumes of the roast mingle with the 
perfimie of the flowers; the purple of the wine vies in gor- 
geousness with the red of the roses. The waiter who serves 
us has the air of folly and we have the air of gluttons, it is 
all the same to us! We stuff down roast after roast, we 
pour down bordeaux upon burgundy, chartreuse upon cog- 
nac. To the devil with your weak wines and your thirty- 
^es,'*' which we have been drinking since our departure 
from Paris! To the devil with those whimdcalities without 
name, those mysterious pot-house poisons with which we 
have been so crammed to leanness for nearly a month! We 
are unrecognizable; our once peaked faces redden like a 
dnmkard's, we get noisy, with noise in the air we cut loose. 
We nm all over the town that way. 

Evening arrives; we must go back, however. The sister 
who is in charge of the old men's ward says to us in a 
small flute-like voice. 

''Soldiers, gentlemen, you were very cold last nig^t, bnt 
you are going to have a good bed." 

And she leads us into a great room where three nig^t 
lamps, dimly lighted, hang from the ceiling. I have a white 
bed, I sink with delight between the sheets that still smdl 
fresh with the odour of washing. We hear nothing but the 
breathing or the snoring of the sleepers. I am quite waraii 

* Brandy of thirty-six degrees. 



JORIS-KARL HUYSMANS 281 

my eyes dose, I know no longer where I am, when a pro- 
longed chuckling awakes me. I open one eye and I per- 
ceive at the foot of my bed an individual who is looking 
down at me. I sit up in bed. I see before me an old man, 
tall, lean, his eyes haggard, lips slobbering into a rough 
beard. I ask what he wants of me. No answer I I cry 
out: "Go away I Let me sleepi" 

He shows me his fist. I suspect him to be a lunatic I 
roll up my towel, at the end of which I quietly twist a knot; 
he advances one step; I leap to the floor; I parry the fisti- 
cuff he aims at me, and with the towel I deal him a return 
blow full in the left eye. He sees thirty candles, he throws 
himself at me; I draw back and let fly a vigourous kick in 
the stomach. He timibles, carrying with him a chair that 
rebounds; the dormitory is awakened; Francis runs up in 
his shirt to lend me assistance; the sister arrives; the nurses 
dart upon the madman, whom they flog and succeed with 
great difficulty in putting in bed again. The aspect of the 
dormitory was eminently ludicrous; to the gloom of faded 
rose, which the dying night lamps had ^read around them, 
succeeded the flaming of three lanterns. The black ceiling, 
with its rings of light that danced above the bummg wicks, 
glittered now with its tints of freshly spread plaster. The 
sick men, a collection of Punch and Judies without age, had 
clutched the piece of wood that hung at the end of a cord 
above their heads, hung on to it witib one hand, and with 
the other made gestures of terror. At that sight my anger 
cools, I split with laughter, the pamter suffocates, it is only 
the sister who preserves her gravity and succeeds by force 
of threats and entreaties in restoring order in the room. 

Night came to an end, for good or ill ; in the mommg at 
six o'clock the rattle of a drum assembled us, the director 
called off the roll. We start for Rouen. Arrived in that 
city, an officer tells the unfortunate man in charge of us that 
the hospital is full and can not take us in. Meanwhile we 
have an hour to wait. I throw my knapsack down into a 
comer of the station, and though my stomadi is on fire, 
we are off, Francis and I, wandering at random, in ecstasies 
before the church of Saint-Ouen, in wonder before the old 



282 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

houses. We admire so, much and so long that the hour had 
long since passed before we even thought of looking for the 
station again. ^'It's a long time since yoiur comrades de- 
parted," one of the employees of the railroad said to us; 
"they are in Evreux." The devil I The next train doesn't 
go until nine o'clock — Come, let's get some dinner!" 

When we arrived at Evreux, midnight had come. We 
could not present ourselves at a ho^ital at such an hour; 
we would have the appearance of malefactors. The night 
is superb, we cross the city and we find ourselves in the 
tfpen fields. It was the time of haying, the piles were in 
stacks. We spy out a little stack in a field, we hollow out 
there two comfortable nests, and I do not know whether 
it is the reminiscent odour of our couch or the penetrating 
perfume of the woods that stirs us, but we fed the need of 
airing our defunct love affairs. The subject was inexhaust- 
ible. Little by little, however, words become fewer, en- 
thusiasm dies out, we fall asleep. "Sacre bleu I" cries my 
neighbour, as he stretches himself. "What time can it be?" 
I awake in turn. The sun will not be late in rising, for the 
great blue curtain is laced at the horizon with a fringe of 
rose. What misery! It will be necessary now to go knock 
at the door of the hospital, to sleep m wards impregnated 
with that heavy smell through which returns, like an ob- 
stinate refrain, the acrid flower of powder of iodoformi All 
sadly we take our way to the ho^ital again. They open 
to us but alas! one only of us is admitted, Francis — and I, 
they send me on to the lyceum. This life is no longer pos- 
sible, I meditate an escape, the house surgeon on duty comes 
down into the courtyard. I show him my law-school di- 
ploma; he knows Paris, the Latin Qiiarter. I expldn to him 
my situation. "It has come to an absolute necesaty." I 
tell him "that either Francis comes to the lyceum or that I 
go to rejoin him at the ho^ital." He thinks it over, and 
in the evening, coming dose to my bed, he slips these words 
into my ear: "Tell them to-morrow morning that your suf- 
ferings increase." The next day, in fact, at about aevoi 
o'clodc, the doctor makes his appearance; a good, an et- 
cell^t man, who had but two faults; that of odouroos teetfi 



JORIS'KARL HVYSMANS 283 

and that of desiring to get rid of his patients at any cost 
Every morning the following scene took place: 

''Ah, ha I the fine fellow," he cries, ''what an air he has! 
good colour, no fever. Get up and go take a good cup of 
cofifee; but no fooling, you know I don't go running after 
the girls; I will sign for you your Exeat; you will return 
to-morrow to your regiment." 

Sick or not sick, he s^t back three a day. That mom* 
ing he stops in front of me and says: 

"Ah! saperlotte, my boy, you look better!" 

I exclaim that never have I suffered so 'much. 

He sounds my stomach. "But you are better," he mur* 
murs; "the stomadi is not so hard." I piotest— he seems 
astonished, the interne then says to him in an imdertone: 

"We ought perhaps to give him an injection; and we 
have here neither syringe nor stomach-pump; if we send 
him to the hospital ?" 

"Come, now, that's an idea!" says the good man, ddighted 
at getting rid of me, and then and there he signs the order 
for my admission. Joyfully I buckle on my knapsack, and 
under guard of one of the servants of the lyceum I make 
my entrance at the hospital. I find Francis again! By 
incredible' good luck the St. Vincent corridor, where he 
sleeps, in default of a room in the wards, contains one empty 
bed next to his. We are at last reunited! In addition to 
our two beds, five cots stretch, one after the other, along the 
yellow glazed walls. For occupants they have a soldier of 
the line, two artiller3mien, a dragoon, and a hussar. The 
rest of the hospital is made up of certain old men, crack- 
brained and weak-bodied, some young men, rickety or 
bandy-legged, and a great number of soldiers — ^wrecks from 
MacMahon's army — who, after being floated on from one 
military hospital to another, had come to be stranded on this 
bank. Francis and I, we are the only ones who wear the 
imiform of the Seine militia; our bed neighbours were good 
enough fellows; one, to tell the truth, quite as insignificant 
as another; they were, for the most part, the sons of pea^* 
ants or farmers called to serve under the flag after the deda- 
lation of war. 



284 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

While I am taking off my vest, there comes a sbter, aa 
frail, sa pretty that I can not keep from looking at her; the 
beautiful big eyes! tne long blonde lashes! the pretty teeth! 
She asks mS why I have left the lyceimi; I explain to her 
in roimd-about phrases how the absence of a forcing pxmip 
caused me to be sent back from the college. She smiles 
gently and says to me: ''Ah, sir soldier, you could have called 
the Aing by name; we are used to everything.'' I should 
think she was used to everything, unfortunate woman, for 
the soldiers constrained themselves but little in delivering 
themselves of their indiscreet amenities before her. Yet 
never did I see her blush. She passed among them mute^ 
her eyes lowered, seeming not to hear the coarse jokes re- 
tailed around her. 

Heavens! how she spoiled me! I see her rtow in the 
morning, as the sun breaks on the stone floor the shadows 
of the window bars, approaching slowly from the far end 
of the corridor, the great wings of her bonnet flapping at 
her face. She comes close to my bed with a dish that 
smokes, and on the edge of which glistens her wdl-trimmed 
finger nail. "The soup is a little thin to-day," she says 
widi her pretty smile, "so I bring you some chocolate. Eat 
it quick while it's hot!" 

In spite of the care she lavished upon me, I was bored 
to death in that hospital. My friend and I, we had reached 
that degree of brutishness that throws you on your bed, try- 
ing to kill in animal drow^ess the long hours of insup- 
portable days. The only distractions offered us consisted 
in a breakfast and a dinner composed of boiled beef, water- 
melon, prunes, and a finger of wine — ^the whole of not suf- 
ficient quantity to nouri^ a man. 

Thanks to my ordinary politeness toward the sisters and 
to the prescription labels that I wrote for them, I obtained 
fortunately a cutlet now and then and a pear picked in the 
hospital orchard. I was, then, on the whole, the least to be 
pitied of all the soldiers packed together, peQ-mdl, in the 
wards, but during the first days I could not succeed even 
in swallowing the meagre morning dole. It was inspetidoBL 
teur, and the doctor chose that moment to perfoim Uf 



JORIS'KARL BVYSMANS 285 

qperations. Tlie second day after my arrival he riiv>ed a 
thig^ open from top to bottom; I heard a pierdng cry; I 
dosed my eyes, not enough, however, to avoid seemg a red 
stream spurt in great jets on to the doctor's apron. That 
morning I could eat no more. Little by little, however, I 
grew accustomed to it; soon I contented m3rself by merdy 
turning my head away and keqping my soup. 

In tiie meanwhile tiie situation became intolerable. We 
tried, but in vain, to procure newspapers and books; we 
were reduced to masquerading, to donning the hussar's vest 
for fun. This puerile fooling quickly wore itsdf out, and 
stretching ourselves every twenty minutes, exchanging a 
few words, we dive our heads into the bolsters. 

There was not much conversation to be drawn from our 
comrades. The two artiller3maen and the hussar were too 
ack to talk. The dragoon swore by the name of heaven, 
saying nothing, got up every instant, enveloped in his great 
white mantle, and went to the wash-bowls, whose sloppy 
condition he reported by means of his bare feet. There were 
some old saucepans lying about in which the convalescents 
pretended to cook, offering their stew in jest to the sbters. 

There remained, then, only the soldier of the line: an 
unfortunate grocer's clerk, father of a child, called to the 
army, stricken constantly by fever, shivering under his bed- 
dothes. 

Squatting, tailor-fashion, on our bed, we listen to him 
recount the battle in which he was picked up. Cast out 
near Froeschwiller, on a plain surrounded with woods, he 
had seen the red flashes shoot by in bouquets of white smoke, 
and he had ducked, trembling, bewildered by the cannon- 
ading, wild with the whistling of the balls. He had marched, 
mixed in with the regiments, through the thick mud, not 
seeing a single Prussian, not knowing in what direction they 
were, hearing on all sides groans, cut by sharp cries, then 
the ranks of the soldiers placed in front of him, all at once 
turned, and in the confusion of flight he had been, without 
knowing how, thrown to the ground. He had picked him- 
sdf up and had fled, abandoning his gun and knapsack, end 
at last, worn out by the forced marches endured for dj^t 



286 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

days, undermined by fear, weakened by hunger, he had 
rested himself in a trench. He had remained there dazed, 
inert, stimned by the roar of the bombs, resolved no longer 
to defend himself, to move no more; then he thought of his 
wife, and, weeping, demanded what he had done that they 
shotdd make him suffer so; he picked up, without knowing 
why, the leaf of a tree, which he kept, and which he had 
about him now, for he showed it to us often, dried and 
shriveled at the bottom of his pockets. 

An officer had passed meanwhile, revolver in hand, had 
called him '^coward," and threatened to break his hc^ if 
he did not march. He had replied: '^That would please me 
above all things. Oh, that this would end!" But the offi- 
cer at the very moment he was shaking him on to his feet 
was stretched out, the blood bursting, spurtmg from his 
neck. Then fear took possession of him; he fled and suc- 
ceeded in reaching a road far off, overrun with the flying, 
black with troops, furrowed by gun-carriages whose dying 
horses broke and crushed the ranks. 

They succeeded at last in putting themselves under shel- 
ter. The cry of treason arose from the groups. Old soldiers 
seemed once more resolved, but the recruits refused to go 
on. "Let them go and be killed," they said, mdicating ^e 
officers; "that's their profession. As for me I have children; 
it's not the State that will take care of them if I diet" And 
they envied the fate of those who were slightly wounded 
and the sick who were allowed to take refuge in the ambu- 
lances. 

"Ah, how afraid one gets, and, then, how one holds in 
the ear the voices of men calling for their mothers and 
begging for something to drink," he added, shivering all 
over. He paused, and, looking about the corridor wi& an 
air of content, he continued: "It's all the same, I am very 
happy to be here; and then, as it is, my wife can write to 
me," and he drew from his trousers pocket some letters, 
saying with satisfaction: "The little one has written, look!*' 
and he pointed out at the foot of the paper under his wife's 
laboured handwriting, some up-and-down strokes formiiig a 



JORIS-KARL HUYSMANS 287 

dictated sentence, where there woe some **t kiss papas" in 
blots of ink. 

We Kstened twenty times at least to that story, and we 
had to suffer during mortal hours the repetiti(xis of that man, 
ddi^ted at having a child. We ended by stopping our 
ears and by trying to sleep so as not to hear him any more. 

This deplorable life threatened to prolong itself, when one 
morning Francis, who, contrary to his habit, had been prowK 
ing around the whole of the evening before in the court* 
yiud, sa3rs to me: ''I say, Eugtoe, come out and breathe a 
little of the air of the fields." I prick my ears. "There is a 
field reserved for lunatics," he continued; "that field is 
empty; by climbing onto the roofs of the outhouses, and 
that is easy, thanks to the gratings that ornament the win- 
dows, we can reach the coping of the wall; we jump and 
we tumble into the counUy. Two steps from the wall 
is one of the gates of Evreux. What do you say?" 

I say — I say that I am quite willing to go out, but 
how shall we get back? 

"I do not know anything about that; first let us g^ 
out, we will plan afterward. Come, get up, they are 
going to serve the soup; we jump the wall after." 

I get up. The hospital lacked water, so much so that 
I was reduced to waging in the seltzer water which the 
sister had had sent to me. I take my siphon, I mark 
the painter who cries fire, I press the trigger, the dis- 
charge hits him full in his face; then I place myself in 
front of him, I receive the stream in my beard, I rub my 
nose with the lather, I dry my face. We are ready, we 
go do^vnstairs. The field is deserted; we scale the wall; 
Francis takes his measure and jimips. I am sitting 
astride the coping of the wall, I cast a n^id glance around 
me; below, a ditch and some grass, on the right one of 
the gates of the town; in the distance, a forest that sways 
and shows its rents of golden red against a band of pi^ 
blue. I stand up; I hear a noise in the court; I jump; 
we skirt the walls; we are in Evreuxl 

Shall we eat? Motion adopted. 

Making our w^v ^'n ^AArrh of a r'sting-place, we per- 



288 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

ceive two little women wagging along. We follow them 
and offer to breakfast with them; they refuse; we insist; 
they answer no less gently; we insist again; they say yes. 
We go home with them, with a n^t-pie, bottles of wine, 
^gs, and a cold chicken. It seems odd to us to find 
ourselves in a light room himg with paper ^x)tted with 
lilac blossoms and green leaves; there are at the case- 
ments damask curtains of red currant colour, a mirror over 
the fireplace, an engraving representing a Christ tor- 
mented by the Pharisees. Six chairs of cherry wood and 
a round table with an oilcloth showing the kings of France, 
a bedspread with eiderdown of pink muslin. We set the 
table, we look with greedy eye at the ^rls moving about 
It takes a long time to get things ready, for we stop them for 
a kiss in passing; for the rest, they are ugly and stupid 
enough. But what is that to us? It's so long since we 
have scented the mouth of woman! 

I carve the chicken; the corks fly, we drink like topers, 
we eat like ogres. The coffee steams in the cups; we gild 
it with cognac; my melancholy flies away, the pimch 
kindles, the blue flames of the Kirschwasser leap in the 
salad bowl, the girls giggle, their hair in iheii eyes. Sud- 
denly four strokes ring out slowly from the church tower. 
It is four o'clock. And the hospital! Good heavens, we 
had forgotten it! I turn pale. Francis looks at me in 
fright, we tear ourselves from the arms of our hostesses, 
we go out at double quick. 

"How to get in?" says the painter. 

Alas! we have no choice; we shall get there scarcdy in 
time for supper. Let's trust to the mercy of heaven and 
make for the great gate! 

We get there; we ring; tiie sister condirge is about 
to open the door for us and stands amazed. We salute 
her, and I say loud enough to be heard by her: 

"I say, do you know, they are not very amiable at that 
commissariat; the fat one specially received us only mofe 
or less civilly." 

The sister breathes not a word. We run at a gallop for 
the messroom; it was time, I "heard the voice of Si^er 



JORIS-KARL HVYSMANS 289 

AngUe who was distributiiig the rations. I went to bed 
as quickly as possible, I covered with my hand a spot my 
beauty had given me the length of my nedL; the sister looks 
at me, finds in my eyes an unwonted sparkle, and asks 
with interest: "Are your pains worse?" 

I reassure her and reply: ''On the contrary, sister, I am 
better; but this idleness and this imprisonment are killing 
me." 

When I speak of the appalling ennui that is trying me, 
sunk in this company, in the midst of the coimtry, far from 
my own people, she does not reply, but her lips dose tig^t, 
her eyes take on an indefinable expression of melancholy 
and of pity. One day she said to me in a dry tone: "Oh, 
liberty's worth nothing to you," alluding to a conversation 
she had overheard between Francis and me, discussing the 
charming allurements of Parisian women; then she softened 
end added with her fascinating little moue: ''You are really 
not serious, Mr. Soldier." 

The next morning we agreed, the painter and I, that as 
soon as the soup was swdlowai, we would scale the wall 
again. At the time appointed we prowl about the field; 
the door is dosed. "Bast, worse lu^l" says Francis, **&$ 
avantf" and he turns toward the great door of the hos- 
pital. I follow him. The sister in charge asks where we 
are going. "To the commissariat." The door opens, we 
are outside. 

Arrived at the grand square of the town, in front of the 
church, I perceive, as we contemplate the sculptures of the 
porch, a stout gentleman with a face like a red moon brist- 
ling with white mustaches, who stares at us in astonishment. 
We stare back at him, boldly, and continue on oiur way. 
Francis is dying of thirst; we enter a caf6, and, while sip- 
ping my demi-tasse, I cast my eyes over the local paper, 
and I find there a name that sets pfie dreaming. I did 
not know, to tell the truth, the person who bore it, but that 
name recalled to me memories long smce effaced. I remem- 
bered that one of my friends had a rdation in a very hi^ 
position in the town of Evreux. "It is absolutely neces- 
sary for me to see him," I say to ihe pahiter; I ask his 



290 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

address of the caf6-keeper; he does not know it; I go oat 
and visit all the bakers and the druggists that I meet with. 
Every one eats bread and takes medicine; it is intipoaable 
that one of those manufacturers should not know the ad- 
dress of Monsieiu: de Fr£ch£d6. I did find it there, in 
fact; I dust off my blouse, I buy a black cravat, gloves, 
and I go and ring g^tly, m the Rue Chatrain, at the 
iron grating of a private residence which rears its biidL 
facade and slate roofs in the clearing of a sunny park. A 
servant lets me in. Monsieur de Fr£ch£d£ is absent, but 
Madame is at home. I wait for a few seconds in a salon; 
the portiere is raised and an old lady appears. , She has 
an air so affsCble that I am reassured. I eiplain to her 
in a few words who I am. 

^'Sir," she says with a kind smOe, "I have often heard 
speak of your family. I think, even, that I have met at 
Madame Lezant's, madame, your mother, during my last 
journey to Paris; you are welcome here." 

We talked a long time; I, somewhat embarrassed, oofv- 
ering with my k6pi the spot cm my neck; she trying to per- 
suade me to accept some money, which I refuse. 

She says to me at last: '1 desire with all my heart to be 
useful to you. What can I do?" I reply: "Heavens^ 
Madame, if you could get them to send me back to Pftris^ 
you would render me a great service; communications wOl 
be interrupted very soon, if die newq[>apers are to be be- 
lieved; they talk of cmother coup (Titat, or the overthrow 
of the Empire; I have great need of seeing my mother 
again; and especially of not letting mysdf l^ taken pris- 
oner here if the Prussians come." 

In the meanwhile Monsieur de FrichSd6 enters. In two 
words he is made acquainted with the ^tuation. 

'If you wish to come with me to the doctor of the hot- 
pital," he says, "you have no time to lose." 

To the doctor! Good heavens! and how account to him 
for my absence from the hospital? I dare not breathe a 
word; I follow my protector, asking myself how it will aH 
end. We arrive; the doctor looks at me with a stiqpefied 
air. I do not give him time to open his mouth, and I 



JORIS'KARL BUYSMANS tgi 

^deliver -with procBgious volubility a string of Jeremiads over 
my sad position. 

Monsieur de Fr6chSd6 in his turn takes vp the argu- 
ment, and asks him, in my favour, to give me a oonvalea- 
cent's leave of absence for two months. 

'^Monsieur is, in fact, sick enou^,|' says the doctor, ''to 
be entitled to two mondis' rest; if my colleagues and if the 
General look at it as I do your prot^ will be aMe in a 
few days to return to Paris." 

''That's good,^' replies Mcmsieur de FrdchM& '1 thank 
you, doctor; I will speak to the General myself to-nig^t" 

We are in the street; I heave a great si^ of rdief; 
I press the hand of that excelloit man who shows so kindly 
an interest in me. I run to find Frauds again. We have 
but just time to get back; we arrive at the gate of the 
hospital; Francis rings; I salute the sister. She stops me: 
"Did you not tell me this morning tlmt you were gdng 
to the commissariat?" 

"Quite right, sister." 

"Very well; the General has just left here. Go and see 
the director and Sister Ang^le; they are wdting for you; 
you will explain to them, no doubt, the object of 3fOur 
visits to the commissariat." 

We remoimt, all crestfallen, the dormitory stairs. Sister 
Ang^le is there, who waits for us, and who says: 

"Never could I have believed such a thing! You have 
been all over the city, yesterday and to-day, and Heaven 
knows what kind of life you have been leading I" 

"Oh, really!" I exdahn. \ 

She looked at me so fixedly that I breathed not another 
word. 

"All the same," she continued, "the General himsdf 
met you on the Grand Square to-day. I denied that you 
had gone out, and I searched for you all over the ho^ital. 
The General was right, you were not here. He asked me 
for yoiu: names; I gave him the name of cme of you, I 
refused to reveal the other, and I did wrong, that is cer- 
tain, for you do not deserve it I" 

^Oh, how much I thank you, my dsterl'' But Sister 



292 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

Ang^le did not listen to me. She was indignant over my 
conduct! There was but one thing to do; keep quiet and 
accept the downpour without trying to shelter myself. 

In the meantime Francis was smnmoned before the di- 
rector, and since, I do not know why, they suspected him 
of corrupting me; and since he was, moreover, by reason 
of his foolery, in bad odour with the doctor and the sisters, 
he was informed that he must leave the hospital the fol- 
lowing day and join his corps at once. 

"Those huzzies with whom we dined yesterday arc 
licensed women, who have sold us; it was the dkector 
himself who told me," he declared furiously. 

All the time we are cursing the jades and lamenting over 
our uniforms which made us so recognizable, the nmiour 
nms that the Emperor is taken prisoner and that the Re- 
public has been proclaimed at Paris; I give a franc to an 
old man who was allowed to go out and who brings me 
a copy of the "Gaulois." The news is true. The ho^ital 
exults. Badinguet fallen! it is not too soon; good-by to the 
war that is ended at last. 

The following morning Francis and I, we embrace and 
he departs. "Till we meet again," he shouts to me as he 
shuts the gate; "and in Paris!" 

Oh, the days that followed that day! What suJGfering; 
what desolation! Impossible to leave the hospital; a sen- 
tinel paced up and down, in my honour, before the door. 
I had, however, spirit enough not to try to sleep. I paced 
like a caged beast in the yard. I prowled thus for the 
space of twelve hours. I knew my prison to its smallest 
cranny. I knew the spots where the lichens and the 
mosses pushed up through the sections of the wall which 
had given way in cracking. Disgust for my corridor, for 
my truckle-bed flattened out like a pancake, for my linen 
rotten with dirt, took hold of me. I lived isolated, speak- 
ing to no one, beating the flint stones of the courtyard with 
my feet, straying, like a troubled soul, imder the arcactes 
whitewashed with yellow ochre the same as the wards, com- 
ing back to the grated entrance gate surmoimted by a 
iSag, mounting to the firct floor ^Vier* ^y bed was> descend- 



JORIS-KARL BUYSMANS 293 

ing to where the kitchoi shone, flashing the sparkle of 
its red copper through the bare xiakedness of the scene. I 
gnawed my fists with impatience, watching at certain hours 
the mingled coming and going of civilians and soldiers, pass- 
ing and rq[>assmg on every floor, filling the galleries with 
their interminable march. 

I had no longer any strength left to re^st the perse- 
cution of the sisters, who drove us on Simday into the 
chapel. I became a monomaniac; one fixed idea haimted 
me; to flee as quickly as possible that lamentable jail. 
With that, money worry oppressed me. My mother had 
forwarded a hundred francs to me at Dunkirk, where it 
seems I ought to be. The money never appeared. I saw 
the time when I should not have a sou to buy either paper 
or tobacco. 

Meanwhile the days passed. The De Fr^chSd^ seemed 
to have forgotten me, and I attributed their silence to my 
escapades, of which they had no doubt been informed. 
Soon to all these anxieties were added horrible pains: ill- 
cared for and aggravated by my chase after petticoats, my 
bowels became inflamed. I suffered so that I came to fear 
I should no longer be able to bear the journey. I con- 
cealed my sufferings, fearing the doctor would force me to 
stay longer at the hospital. I keep my bed for a few 
days; then, as I felt my strength diminishing, I wished to 
get up, in spite of all, and I went downstairs into the yard. 
Sister Angele no longer spoke to me, and in the evening, 
while she made her roimds in the corridor and in the mess, 
turning so as not to notice the sparks of the forbidden 
pipes that glowed in the shadows, she passed before me, 
indifferent, cold, turning away her eyes. One morning, 
however, when I had dragged myself into the courtyard and 
sunk down on every bench to rest, she saw me so changed, 
so pale, that she could not keep from a movement of com- 
passion. In the evening, after she had finished her visit 
to the dormitories, I was leaning with one elbow on my 
bolster, and, with eyes wide open, I was looking at the 
bluish beams which the moon cast through the windows of 
the corridor, when the door at the farther end opened 



294 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

again, and I saw, now bathed in silver vapour, now in shadow, 
and as if clothed in black crepe, according as to whether 
she passed before the casements or along the walls. Sister 
Angele, who was coming toward me. She was smiling 
gently. "To-morrow morning," she said to me, "you are 
to be examined by the doctors. I saw Madame de Fride- 
chi to-day; it is probable that you will start for Paris in 
two or tiiree days." I spring up in my bed, my face 
brightens, I wanted to jump and ^g; never was I happier. 
Morning rises. I dress, and uneasy, nevertheless, I direct 
my way to the room where sits a board of of&cers and 
doctors. 

One by one the soldiers exhibit their bodies gouged with 
wounds or bunched with hair. The General scraped one 
of his finger nails, the Colonel of the Gendarmerie* fans 
himself with a newspaper;. the practitioners talk among them- 
selves as they fed the men. My turn comes at last. They 
examine me from head to foot, they press down on my 
stomach, swollen and tense like a balloon, and with a un- 
animity of opinion the coimcil grants me a convalescent's 
leave of sixty days. 

I am going at last to see my mother, to recover my cu- 
rios, my books! I feel no more the redhot iron that bums 
my entrails; I leap like a kidi 

I annoimce to my family the good news. My mother 
writes me letter after letter, wondering why I dp not come. 
Alas! my order of absence must be countersigned at the 
division headquarters at Rouen. It comes bac^ after five 
days; I am "in order"; I go to find Sister Angile; I beg 
her to obtain for me before the time fixed for my departure 
permission to go into the city to thank De Fr£chea6, who 
have been so good to me. She goes to look for the director 
and brings me back permission. I run to the house of Uiose 
kind people, who force me to accept a dlk handkerchief 
and fifty francs for the joiuney. I go in search of my 
papers at the commissariat. I return to the ho^ital, I 
have but a few minutes to spa^ I go in quest of Sstcr 

♦Armed police 



JORIS'KARL HUYSMANS 295 

Ang^e, whom I find in the garden, and I say to het witV 
great emotion: 

''Oh, dear Sister, I am leaving; how can I ever repay 
you for all that you have done for me?" 

I take her hand which she tries to withdraw, and I carry 
it to my lips. She grows red. ''Adieu!" she murmurs, and 
menacing me with her finger, she adds playfully, "Be good! 
and above all do not make any wicked acquaintances on 
the journey." 

"Oh, do not fear, my Sister. I promise you I" 

The hour strikes; the door opens; I hurry off to the 
station; I jump into a (lar; the train moves; I have left 
Evreux. The coach is half full, but I occupy, fortunately, 
one of the comers. I put my nose out of the window; 
I see seme pollarded trees, the tops of a few hills that undu- 
late away into the distance, a bridge astride of a great pond 
that sparkles in the sun like burnished glass. All this is 
not very pleasing. I sink back in my comer, looking now 
and then at the telegraph wires that stripe the ultramarine 
sky with their black Imes, when the train stops, the trav- 
ellers who are about me descend, the door shuts, then 
opens again and makes way for a young woman. While 
she seats herself and arranges her dress, I catch a glimpse 
of her face imder the displacing of her veil. She is charm- 
ing; with her eyes full of the blue of heaven, her lips 
stained with purple, her white teeth, her hair the coloiu: of 
ripe com. I engage her in conversation. She is called 
Reine; embroiders flowers; we chat like old friends. Sud- 
denly she turns pale, and is about to faint. I open the 
windows, I offer her a bottle of salts which I have carried 
with me ever since my departure from Paris; she thanks 
me, it is nothing, she says, and she leans on my knapsack 
and <ries to sleep. Fortunately we are alone in the com- 
partment, but the wooden partition that divides into equal 
parts the body of the carriage comes up only as far as the 
waist, and one can see and above all hear Uie clamor and 
the coarse laughter of the country men and women. I 
could have thrashed them with hearty good will, these im- 
beciles who were troubling her sleep! I contented myadf 



296 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

with listening to the commonplace opinions which they 
changed on politics. I soon have enough of it; I stop 
my ears. I too, try to sleep; but that phrase which was 
spoken by the station-master of the last station, "You will 
not get to Paris, the rails are torn up at Mantes," returned 
in my dreams like an obstinate refrain. I open my eyts. 
My neighbour wakes up, too; I do not wish to share my fears 
with her; we talk in a low voice. She tells me that she is 
going to join her mother at Sfevres. "But," I say to her, 
"the train will scarcely enter Paris before eleven o'clock 
to-night. You will never have time to reach the landing 
on the left bank." 

"What shall I do?" she says, "if my brother is not down 
at my arrival?" 

Oh, misery, I am as dirty as a comb and my stomadi 
bums I I can not dream of taking her to my bachetor 
lodgings, and then I wish before all to see my mother. What 
to do? I look at Reine with distress. I take her hand; 
at that moment the train takes a curve, the jerk throws her 
forward; our lips approach, they touch, I press mine; she 
turns red. Good heavens, her mouth moves imperceptibly; 
she returns my kiss; a long thrill runs up my spine; at 
contact of those ardent embers my senses fail. Oh! Sister 
AngMe, Sister Angele! a man can not make himself overt 
And the train roars and rolls onward, without slackening 
speed; we are Hying under full steam toward Mantes; my 
fears are vain; the track is clear. Reine half shuts her 
eyes; her head falls on my shoulder; her little waves of 
hair tangle with my beard and tickle my lips. I put my 
arm about her waist, which )delds, and I rock her. Paris 
is not far; we pass the frei^t-dqx)ts, by the roundhouses 
where the engines roar in red vapour, getting up steam; the 
train stops; they take up the tickets. After reflection, I 
will take Reine to my bachelor rooms, provided her brother 
is not waiting her arrival. We descend from the carriage; 
her brother is there. "In five days," she says, with a IdsB, 
and the pretty bird has flown. Five days after I was hi 
my bed, atrociously sick, and the Pn^ans occupy Sivres. 

Np^er RiT''*'* thPi V»q.\r« ' c^«vk hpr 



JORIS-KARL HVYSMANS ag; 

My heart is heavy. I heave a deep si^; this is not, 
liowever, the time to be sadi I am jolting on in a fiacre. 
I recognise the neighbourhood; I arrive before my mother's 
house; I dash up the steps, four at a time. I pull the beU 
violently; the maid opens the door. 'It's Monsieur I" and 
she runs to tell my mother, who darts out to meet me, turns 
pale, embraces me, looks me over from head to foot, steps 
back a little, looks at me once more, and hugs me again. 
Meanwhile the servant has stripped the buffet. ''You must 
be hungry, M. Eugene?" I should think I was hungryl 
I devour everything they give me. I toss off great glasses 
of wine; to tell the truth, I do not know what I am eating 
and what I am drinkingi 

At length I go to my rooms to rest. I find my lodging 
just as I left it. I run through it, radiant, then I sit down 
on the divan and I rest there, ecstatic, beatific, feasting my 
eyes with the view of my knickknacks and my books. I 
undress, however; I splash about in a great tub, rejoicing that 
for the first time in many months I am going to get into a 
dean bed with white feet and toenails trimmed. I spring 
onto the mattress, which reboimds. I dive my head into 
the feather pillow, my eyes close; I soar on full wings into 
the land of dreams. 

I seem to see Francis, who is lighting his enormous wood- 
en pipe, and Sister AngMe, who is contemplating me with 
her little moue; then Reine advances toward me, I awake 
'with a start, I behave like an idiot, I sink back again up 
to my ears, but the pains in my bowels, calmed for a mo- 
ment, awake, now that the nerves become less tense, and 
I rub my stomach gently, thinking that the horrors of 
dysentery are at last over! I am at home. I have my 
rooms to myself, and I say to myself that one must have 
lived in the promiscuosity of ho^itals and camps to appre- 
ciate the value of a basin of water, to appreciate the soli- 
tude where modesty may rest at ease. 



THE SUBSTITCTE 

'U PjtmfUgtmi} 
hr FZAKfOIS COPPEE 

HE w^^ -^jiZ'jLj ^JSL ytan did nen he w fict aumtJ 
if*: vx,« thus to fee jods: 
/ %:r. '^'!«::^ Jtssr^ Fr^nqrAs Letnrc. and for six mondis I 
yr^\ v.:v. tr.t ttj^t, -^ho senzs and play? npoo a oofd of catgK 
\>^y.*^i ^jTJ: :a.-2t^nTiS at the Race de la BasdDe. I sang 
th#; T*:iT>J.r'. with h:m. and after that I called, 'Here's all die 
Ti*:'/i v/ri^r^, t/m f^/rn times, two sous!' He was almjs dnnk, 
hiit\ mM Uj \jt:^i mt. That is why the police picked me 
u\t ihf. ffthirr nj;dit. Before that I was with the man who 
u^\\\ bru^hrr"-,. My mother was a laundress: her name was 
Mt'lf,. At hTit time she lived with a man on the gmand- 
iWtr at Montmartre. She was a good work-woman and 
UVj(\ tui'. She ma/le money because she had for customen 
wait«'rs in the cafAs, and they use a good deal of linen. On 
Su/irlays <-:he usr:r] to put me to bed early so that she coidd 
tra Uf thf? hall. On week-days she sent me to Les FrER% 
whf-re I learned to read. Well, the sergeant-de-ville whose 
iH'at wan in /jur street used always to stop before onr win- 
dows to talk with her — a good-looking chap, with a medd 
from the (*rimca. They were married, and after that 
everything went wrong. He didn't take to me, and tamed 
mother a^ainAt me. Every one had a blow for me, and 80^ 
to K^*t out of the house, I spent whole days in the Flaci 
Clichy, where I knew the mountebanks. My father-in-la* 

Trutihlatcd by Walter Learned. Copyright, 1890^ bf 
Druthers. 

998 



PRANQOIS C0PP6E 299 

lost his place, and my mother her work. She used to go 
out washing to take care of him; this gave her a cou^i— 
the steam. . . . She is dead at Lamboisiire. She was a 
good woman. Since that I have lived with the seller of 
brushes and the catgut scraper. Are you going to send 
me to prison?" 

He said this openly, cynically, like a man. He was a 
little ragged street-arab, as tall as a boot, his forehead hid- 
den under a queer mop of yellow hair. 

Nobody claimed him, and they sent him to the Reform 
School. 

Not very intelligent, idle, clumsy with his hands, the only 
trade he could learn there was not a good one — that of 
reseating straw chairs. However, he was obedient, natu- 
rally quiet and silent, and he did not seem to be profoundly 
corrupted by that sdiool of vice. But when, in his seven- 
teenth year, he was thrown out again on the streets of 
Paris, he imhappily foimd there his prison comrades, all 
great scamps, exercising their dirty professions: teadiing 
dogs to catch rats in the sewers, and blacking shoes on ball 
ni^ts in the passage of the Opera — amateur wrestlers, who 
permitted themselves to be thrown by the Hercules of the 
booths — or fishing at noontime from rafts; all of these 
occupations he followed to some extent, and, some months 
after he came out of the house of correction, he was ar- 
rested again for a petty theft — a pair of old shoes prigged 
from a shop- window. Result: a year in the prison of Sainte 
Pelagic, where he served as valet to the political prisoners. 

He lived in much surprise among this group of prisoners, 
all very young, negligent in dress, who talked in loud voices, 
and carried their heads in a very solemn fashion. They 
used to meet in the cell of one of the oldest of them, a fellow 
of some thirty years, already a long time in prison and quite 
a fixture at Sainte Pelagie — a large cell, the walls covered 
with coloured caricatures, and from the vrindow of which one 
could see all Paris — its roofs, its spires, and its domes — and 
far away the distant line of hills, blue and indistinct upon 
the sky. There were upon the walls some shelves filled 
with volumes and all the old paraphernalia of a foidng* 



300 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

room: broken masks, rusty foDs, breast-plates^ and ^oves 
that were lo^ng their tow. It was there that the '^poli- 
ticians'' used to dine together, adding to the everlasting 
''soup and beef/' fruit, cheese, and pints of wine which 
Jean Francois went out and got by the can — a tumultuous 
repast interrupted by violent disputes, and where, during 
the dessert, the "Carmagnole" and "Ca Ira" were sung in 
full chorus. They assumed, however, an ur of great dig- 
nity on those days when a newcomer was brought in among 
them, at first entertaining him gravely as a dtizen, but on 
the morrow using him wiSi affectionate familiarity, and call- 
ing him by his nickname. Great words were used there: 
Corporation, Responsibility, and phrases quite unintelligible 
to Jean Franqois — such as this, for example, which he once 
heard imperiously put forth by a frightful little hundibaA 
who blotted some writing-paper every night: 

"It is done. This is the composition of the Cabinet: 
Raymond, the Bureau of Public Instruction; Martial, the 
Interior; and for Foreign Affairs, myself." 

His time done, he wandered again around Paris, watdied 
afar by the police, after the fashion of cockchafers, made by 
cruel children to fly at the end of a string. He became one 
of those fugitive and timid beings whom the law, with a 
sort of coquetry, arrests and releases by turn — sometfanig 
like those platonic fishers who, in order that they may not 
exhaust their fish-pond, throw immediately back in the 
water the fish which has just come out of the net Without 
a suspicion on his part that so much honour had been done 
to so sorry a subject, he had a special bundle of memo- 
randa in the mysterious portfolios of the Rue de J^nialeflL 
His name was written in round hand on the gray papa 
of the cover, and the notes and reports, carefully rl ^ ^fi^i ^ 
gave him his successive appellations: "Name, Leturc;"''the 
prisoner Leturc," and, at last, "the criminal Letnrc" 

He was two years out of prison, dining where he could, 
sleeping in night lodging-houses and sometimes in lime-kitaS) 
and taking part with his fellows in interminable giunes of 
pitch-penny on the boulevards near the banrioB. He mn 
a greasy cap on the back of his head, caipet alippen^ and 



FRANCOIS C0PP6E 301 

a short white blouse. When he had five sous he had his 
hair curled. He danced at Constant's at Montpamasse; 
bought for two sous to sell for four at the door of Bobino, 
the jack of hearts or the ace of clubs serving as a counter- 
mark; sometimes opened the door of a carriage; led horses to 
the horse-market. From the lottery of all sorts of miserable 
employments he drew a goodly number. Who can say if 
the atmosphere of honour which one breathes as a soldier, 
if military discipline might not have saved him. Taken, 
in a cast of the net, with some young loafers who robbed 
drunkards sleeping on the streets, he denied very earnestly 
having taken part in their expeditions. Perhaps he told the 
truth, but his antecedents were accepted in lieu of proof, 
and he was sent for three years to Poissy. There he made 
coarse playthings for children, was tattooed on the chest, 
learned thieves* slang and the penal-code. A new liberation, 
and a new plunge into the sink of Paris; but very short 
this time, for at the end of six months at the most he was 
again compromised in a night robbery, aggravated by climb- 
ing and breaking — a serious affair, in which he played an 
obscure role, half dupe and half fence. On the whole his 
complicity was evident, and he was sent for five years at 
hard labour. His grief in this adventure was above all in 
being separated from an old dog which he foimd on a dimg- 
heap, and cured of the mange. The beast loved him. 

Toulon, the ball and chain, the work in the harbour, the 
blows from a stick, wooden shoes on bare feet, soup of black 
beans dating from Trafalgar, no tobacco money, and the 
terrible sleep in a camp swarming with convicts; that was 
what he experienced for five broiling summers and five 
winters raw with the Mediterranean wind. He came out 
from there stunned, was sent under surveillance to Vernon, 
where he worked some time on the river. Then, an incor- 
rigible vagabond, he broke his exile and came again to Paris. 
He had his savings, fifty-six francs, that is to say, time 
enough for reflection. During his absence his former 
wretdied companions had dispersed. He was well hidden, 
and slept in a loft at an old woman's, to whom he repre- 
sented himself as a sailor, tired of the sea, who had lost 



302 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

his papers in a recent shipwreck, and ^Ao wanted to tiy 
his hand at something else. His tanned face and his cal- 
loused hands, together with some sea phrases which he 
dropped from time to time made his tale seem^ probable 
enough. 

One day when he risked a saunter in the streets, and 
when chance had led him as far as Montmartre, where he 
was bom, an unexpected memory stopped him before the 
door of Les Freres, where he had learned to read. As it 
was very warm the door was op)en, and by a single ^ance 
the passing outcast was able to recognise the peacable 
school-room. Nothing was changed: neither the bright 
light shining in at the great windows, nor the crucifix over 
the desk, nor the rows of benches witib the tables furnished 
with ink-stands and p)encils, nor the table of weights and 
measures, nor the m^p where pins stuck in still indicated 
the operations of some ancient war. Heedlessly and with- 
out thinking, Jean Frangois read on the blackboard the 
words of the Evangelist which had been set there as a copy: 

'7oy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repentedi, 
more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no 
repentance." 

It was undoubtedly the hour for recreation, for the 
Brother Professor had left his chair, and, sitting on the edge 
of a table, he was telling a story to the bioys who surrounded 
him with eager and attentive eyes. What a bright and inno- 
cent face he had, that beardless young man, in his long 
black gown, and white necktie, and great u^y shoes, and 
his badly cut brown hair streammg out behind I All the 
simple figures of the children of the people who were watch- 
ing him seemed scarcely less childlike than his; above aD 
when, delighted with some of his own ample and priestly 
pleasantries, he broke out in an op)en and frank peal of 
laughter which showed his white and regular teeth, a peal 
so contagious that all the scholars laughed loudly in their 
turn. It was such a sweet, simple group in the bri^t sun- 
light, which lighted their dear eyes and their blond curb. 

Jean Franqois looked at them for some time in silence, and 
for the first time in that savage nature, all insUnct and appe- 



FRANQOIS C0PP6B 303 

tite, there awoke a mysterious, a tender emotion. His heart, 
that seared and hardened heart, unmoved when the con- 
vict's cudgel or the heavy whip of the watchman fell on his 
shoulders, beat oppressively. In that sight he saw again his 
infancy; and closing his eyes sadly, the prey to torturing 
regret, he walked quickly away. 

Then the words written on the blackboard came back 
to his mind. 

"If it wasn't too late, after all I" he murmured; "if I could 
again, like others, eat honestly my brown bread, and sleep 
my fill without nightmare! The spy must be sharp who 
recognises me. My beard, which I shaved of! down there, 
has grown out thick and strong. One can burrow somewhere 
in the great ant-hill, and work can be foimd. Whoever is 
not worked to death in the hell of the galleys comes out 
agile and robust, and I learned there to climb ropes with 
loads upon my back. Building is going on everywhere here, 
and the masons need helpers. Three francs a day! I 
never earned so much. Let me be forgotten, and that is all 
I ask." 

He followed his courageous resolution; he was faithful 
to it, and after three months he was another man. The mas- 
ter for whom he worked called him his best workman. After 
a long day upon the scaffolding, in the hot sun and the 
dust, constantly bending and raising his back to take the 
hod from the man at his feet and pass it to the man over 
his head, he went for his soup to the cook-shop, tired out, 
his legs aching, his hands burning, his eyelids stuck with 
plaster, but content with himself, and carrying his well- 
eamed money in a knot in his handkerchief. He went out 
now without fear, since he could not be recognised in his 
white mask, and since he had noticed that the suspicious 
glances of the policeman were seldom turned on the tired 
workman. He was quiet and sober. He slept the sound 
sleep of fatigue. He was free! 

At last — oh, supreme recompense! — ^he had a friend! 

He was a fellow-workman like himself, named Savinien, 
a little peasant with red lips who had come to Paris with 
his stick over his shoulder and a bundle on the end of it. 



304 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

fleeing from the wine-shops and going to mass every Sunday. 
Jean Frangois loved him for his piety, for his candour, for 
his honesty, for all that he himself had lost, and so long 
ago. It was a passion, profound and imrestrained, which 
transformed him by fatherly cares and attentions. Savinien, 
himself of a weak and egotistical nature, let things take 
their course, satisfied only m finding a companion who 
shared his horror of the wine-shop, llie two friends lived 
together in a fairly comfortable lodging, but their resoiurces 
were very limited. They were obliged to take into their 
room a third companion, an old Auvergnat, gloomy and ra- 
pacious, who foimd it possible out of his meagre salaiy to 
save something with which to buy a place in his own country. 
Jean Fran<;ois and Savinien were always together. On 
holidays they together took long walks in the environs of 
Paris, and dined under an arbour in one of those small coun- 
try inns where there are a great many mushrooms in the 
sauces and innocent rebusses on the napkins. There Jean 
Frangois learned from his friend all that lore of which they 
who are bom in the city are ignorant: learned the names of 
the trees, the flowers, and the plants; the various seasons 
for harvesting; he heard eagerly the thousand details of a 
labourious country life — the autumn sowing, the winter chores, 
the splendid celebrations of harvest and vintage days, the 
sound of the mills at the water-side, and the flails' striking 
the ground, the tired horses led to water, and the hunting 
in the morning mist; and, above all, the long evenings 
around the fire of vine-shoots, that were shortened by some 
marvellous stories. He discovered in himself a sourre of 
?.magination before unknown, and found a singular deli{^t 
in the recital of events so placid, so calm, so monotonous. 

One thing troubled him, however: it was the fear lest 
Savinien might learn something of his past. Sometimes 
there escaped him some low word of thieves* slang, a vulgv 
gesture — vestiges of his former horrible existence — and he 
felt the pain one feels when old wounds re-open; the more 
because he fancied that he sometimes saw in Savinien the 
awakening of an unhealthy curiosity. When the youQg 
man, already tempted by the pleasures which Paris oficn 



FRANCOIS COPPM 305 

to the poorest, asked him about the mysteries of the great 
dty, Jean Francois feigned ignorance and turned the sub- 
ject; but he felt a vague inquietude for the future of his 
friend. 

His uneasiness was not without foundation. Savinien 
could not long remain the simple rustic that he was on his 
arrival in Paris. If the gross and noisy pleasures of the 
wine-shop always repelled him, he was profoundly troubled 
by other temptations, full of danger for the inexperience of 
his twenty years. When spring came he began to go off 
alone, and at first he wandered about the brilliant entrance 
of some dancing-hall, watching the young girls who went 
in with their arms aroimd each others' waists, talking in 
low tones. Then, one evening, when lilacs perfumed the 
air and the call to quadrilles was most captivating, he crossed 
the threshold, and from that time Jean Franqois observed a 
change, little by little, in his manners and his visage. He 
often borrowed from his friend his scanty savings, and he 
forgot to repay. Jean Franqois, feeling fiiat he was aban- 
doned, jealous and forgiving at the same time, suffered and 
was silent. He felt that he had no right to reproach him, 
but with the foresight of affection he indulged in cruel and 
inevitable presentiments. 

One evening, as he was mounting the stairs to his room, 
absorbed in his thoughts, he heard, as he was about to 
enter, the sound of angry voices, and he recognised that of 
the old Auvergnat who lodged with Savinien and himself. 
An old habit of suspicion made him stop at the fending- 
place and listen to learn the cause of the troiible. 

"Yes," said the Auvergnat, angrily, "I am sure that some 
one has opened my trunk and stolen from it the three louis 
that I had hidden in a little box; and he who has done 
this thing must be one of the two companions who sleep 
here, if it were not the servant Maria. It concerns you as 
much as it does me, since you are the master of the house, 
and I will drag you to the courts if you do not let me 
at once break open the valises of the two masons. My 
poor gold! It was here yesterday in its place, and I wiU 
tell you just what it was, so that if we find it again nobody 



306 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

can accuse me of having lied. Ah, I know them, my three 
beautiful gold pieces, and I can see them as plainly as I 
see youl One piece was more worn than the others; it was 
of greenish gold, with a portrait of the great emperor. The 
other was a great old fellow with a queue and epaulettes; and 
the third, which had on it a Philippe with whiskers, I had 
marked with my teeth. They don't trick me. Do you 
know that I only wanted two more like that to pay for my 
vineyard? Come, search these fellows' things with me, of 
I wfll caTi the policel Hurry up I" 

"All right," said the voice of the landlord; "we will go 
and seardb with Maria. So much the worse for you if we 
find nothing, and the masons get angry. You have forced 
me to it." 

Jean Francois's soul was full of fright. He remembered 
the embarrassed circumstances and the small loans of Sa- 
vinien, and how sober he had seemed for some days. And 
yet he could not believe that he was a thief. He heard the 
Auvergnat panting in his eager search, and he pressed his 
closed fists against his breast as if to still the furious beat- 
ing of his heart. 

"Here they are!" suddenly shouted the victorious miser. 
"Here they are, my louis, my dear treasure; and in the 
Simday vest of that little hypocrite of Limousin! Look, 
landlord, they are just as I told you. Here is the Napoleon, 
the man with a queue, and the Philippe that I have bitten. 
See the dents? Ah, the little beggar with the sanctified air. 
I should have much sooner suspected the other. Ah, the 
wretch! Well, he must go to the convict prison." 

At this moment Jean Francois heard the well-known step 
of Savinien coming slowly up the stairs. 

He is going to his destruction, thought he. Three stories 
I have time! 

And, pushing open the door, he entered the room^ pale 
as death, where he saw the landlord and the servant stupe- 
fied in a comer, while the Auvergnat, on his knees, in the 
disordered heap of clothes, was kissing the pieces of gold. 

"Enough of this," he said, in a thick voice; "I took the 
money, and put it in my comrade's trunk. But that is too 



r 



FRANCOIS COPP£E 307 

bad I am a thief, bat not a Judas. Call the poHoe; I 
will not tiy to escape, only I must say a ivofd to Sa;viiuM 
in private. Here he is." 

In fact, the little Limousin had just arrived, and sedog 
his crime discovered, bdieving himsdf lost, he stood tbera^ 
his eyes fixed, his arms han^ng. 

Jean Francois seized him forcibly by the ned^ as if to 
embrace him; he put his mouth dose to Savfnieii's ear, 
and said to him in a low, supplicating vdce, 

"Keep quiet." \ 

"Leave me alone with him. I tdl y<m I wont go away. 
Lock us in if you wish, but leave us alone." 

With a commanding gesture he diowed than the door. 

They went out. 

Savinien, broken by grief, was dttiug on the bed, and 
lowered his eyes without understanding anything. 

"Listen," said Jean Francois, ^0 came and took hbn by 
the hands. "I understand I You have stolen three goU 
pieces to buy some trifle for a giri. That costs six months 
in prison. But one only comes out from there to go back 
again, and you will become a foliar of police courts and 
tribimals. I understand it I have been seven years at tibe 
Reform School, a year at Saint Pilagie, three years at Pdsqr, 
five years at Toulon. Now, don't be afraid. Evoydiing 
is arranged. I have taken it on my shouldas." 

"It is dreadful," said Savinien; but hope was lyringing 
up again in his cowardly heart 

"When the elder brother is under the flag, the younger 
one does not go," replied Jean Franqob. ''I am your s^ 
stitute, that's all. You care for me a little, do you not? 
I am paid. Don't be childish— don't refuse. They would 
have ^en me again one of these days, for I am a runaway 
from exile. And then, do you see, that life will be less hard 
for me than for you. I know it all, and I shall not conn 
plam if I have not done you this service for nothing, and 
if you swear to me that }^u will never do it again. Savin- 
ien, I have loved you wdl, and your friendship has made 
me happy. It is throu^ it that, dnce I have known yoo, 
I have been honest and pure, as I mifl^t always have been. 



3o8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

perhaps, if I had had, like you, a father to put a tool in 
my hands, a mother to teach me my prayers. It was my 
sole regret that I was useless to you, and that I deceived 
you concerning myself. To-day I have unmasked in saving 
you. It is all right. Do not cry, and embrace me, for al- 
ready I hear heavy boots on the stairs. They are coming 
with the posse, and we must not seem to know each other 
so well before those chaps." 

He pressed Savinien quickly to his breast, thai pushed 
him from him, when the door was thrown wide open. 

It was the landlord and the Auvergnat, who brought the 
police. Jean Francois sprang forward to the landing-place, 
held out his hands for the handcuffs, and said, lau^iing, 
"Forward, bad lot!" 

To-day he is at Cayenne, condonned for life as an in* 
corrigible. 



THE LOST WORDS OF LOVE 

(Les Mots Perdus) 
By CATULLE MENDES 



ONCE upon a time a very cruel fairy, pretty as the 
flowers, but wicked as the serpents who hide in the 
grass ready to spring upon you, resolved to avenge 
herself upon all the people of a great country. Where 
was this country? On the mountain or in the plain, at the 
shore of the river or by the sea? This the story docs not 
tell. Perhaps it was near the kmgdom where the dress- 
makers were very skilful in adorning princesses' robes with 
moons and with stars. And what tihe offence under which 
the fairy smarted? On this point also the story is silent. 
Perhaps they had omitted to offer up prayers to her at the 
baptism of the king's daughter. Be this as it may, it is 
certain that the fairy was in a great rage. 

At first she asked herself whether she should devastate 
the country by sending out the thousands of spirits that 
served her to set fire to all the palaces and all the cottages; 
or whether she should cause all the lilacs and all the roses 
to fade; or whether she should turn all the young girls into 
ugly old women. She could have let loose all the four winds 
in the streets and laid low all the houses and trees. At her 
command fire-spitting moimtains would have buried the 
entire land under a mass of burning lava, and the sim would 
have turned from his path so as not to shine upon the ac- 
cursed city. But she did still worse. Like a thief leisiurdy 

Translated by Thomas Seltzer. Copyright, 1905, by The 
Current Literature Publishing Company. 

.300 



310 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

cboosing the most predous jewels in a case, she removed from 
the memory of men and woman the three divine words: 

"I love you." 

And having wrought this afiBiction, she removed hersdi 
with a smile that would have been more hideous than the 
chtu-ch of the devil had she not had the most beautiful rosy 
lips in all creation. 

II 
• 

At first the men and women only half perceived the wrong 
that had been done them. They felt they lacked something, 
but did not know what. The sweethearts who met in the 
c<;lantine lanes, the married couples who talked confidingly 
to each other behind closed windows and drawn curtains, 
suddenly interrupted themselves and looked at each other 
or embraced. They felt, indeed, the deare to utter a cer- 
tain customary phrase, but they had no idea even of what 
that phrase was. They were astonished, uneasy, but they 
asked no question, for they knew not what question to ask, 
so complete was their forgetfulness of the precious word. 
As yet, however, their suffering was not very great. They 
had so many other words they could whisper to each other, 
so many forms of endearment. 

Alas! It was not long before they were seized with a 
profound melancholy. In vain did they adore each other, in 
vain did they call each other by the tenderest names and 
speak the sweetest language. It was not enough to declare 
that all the bliss lay in their kisses; to swear that they were 
ready to die, he for her and she for him; to call each other: 
"My soul; My flame! My dream!" They instinctively 
felt the need of saying and hearing another word, more 
exquisite than all other words; and with the bitter memory 
of the ecstasy contained in this word came the anguish of 
never again being able to utter or to hear it. 

Quarrels followed in the wake of this distress. Judgfaig 
his happiness incomplete on account of the avowal that was 
henceforth denied to the most ardent lips, the lover demand- 
ed from her and she from him the very thing that neither the 
one nor the other could give, without either knowing what 



CATULLE MENDiS 3" 

that thing was, nor being able to name it. They accused 
each other of coldness, of perfidy, not believing in the ten- 
derness which was not expressed as they dedred it should be. 
Thus the sweethearts soon ceased to have their rendezvous 
in the lanes where the eglantines grew, and even after the 
windows were closed the conjugal chambers echoed only with 
dry conversations from easy-chairs that were never drawn 
close to each other. Can there be joy without love? If 
the country which had incurred the hatred of the fairy had 
been ruined by war, or devastated by pestilence, it could 
not have been as desolute, as mournful, as forlorn as it had 
become on account of the three forgotten words. 

Ill 

There lived in this coimtry a poet whose plight was even 
more pitiful than the plight of all the rest. It was not that 
having a beautiful sweetheart he was in despair at not being 
able to say and to hear the stolen word. He had no sweet- 
heart He was too much in love with the muse. It was 
because he was unable to finish a poem he had begun the 
day before the wicked fairy had accomplished her vengeance. 
And why? Because it just happened that the poem was 
to wind up with "I love you!" and it was impossible to end 
it in any other way. 

The poet struck his brow, took his head between his 
hands, and asked himself: "Have I gone mad?" He \vas 
certain he had foimd the words that were to precede the 
last point of exclamation before he had commenced to write 
the stanza. The proof that he had foimd them was that the 
rhyme with which it was to go was already written. There 
it was — it waited for them, nay, called aloud for them; it 
wanted no others, waiting for them like lips waiting for 
sister lips to kiss them. And this indispensable, fatal phrase 
he had forgotten ; he could not even recall that he had ever 
known it. Surely there was some mystery in this, the poet 
mused imceasingly and with bitter melancholy — oh, the pang 
of interrupted poems! — as he sat at the edge of the forest 
near the limpid fountains where the fairies are wont to dance 
of an evening by starlight. 



312 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

IV 

Now as he sat one morning under the branches of a tree, 
the wicked, thieving fairy saw him and loved him. One 
is not a fairy for nothing; a fairy does not stand on cere- 
mony. Swifter than a butterfly kisses a rose she put her 
lips on his lips, and the poet, greatly preoccupied though he 
was with his ode, could not help but feel the heavenliness of 
her caress. Blue and rose diamond grottos opened up in 
the depths of the earth, Imninous as the stars. Thither the 
poet and the fairy were drawn in a chariot of gold by winged 
steeds who left the earth in their flight. Aiid for a long, 
long time they loved each other, forgetful of all but their 
kisses and smiles. If they ceased for a moment to have 
their mouths imited and to look into each other's eyes, it 
was but to take pleasure in more amiable diversions. 
Gnomes dressed in violet satin, elves attired in a misty haze, 
performed dances before them that fell in rhythm with the 
music of unseen orchestras, while flitting hands that had no 
arms brought them ruby baskets of snow-white fruit, per- 
fumed like a white rose and like a virgin bosom. Or, to 
please the fairy more, the poet recited, while striking the 
chords of a theorbo, the most beautiful verses his fancy 
could conceive. 

Fairy that she was, she had never known joy comparable 
to this of being simg by a beautiful young man who invented 
new songs every day. And when he grew ^ent, and she 
felt the breath of his mouth near her, felt it pas^g throu^ 
her hair, she melted away in tenderness. 

Their happiness seemed without end. Days passed by, 
many, many days, but nothing occurred to disturb their 
joy. And yet she had moments of gloom, when she would 
sit musing, wtih her cheek on her hand and her haur falling 
in streams down to her hips. 

"O queen!" he cried, "what is it that makes you sad; 
what more can you desire, seeing that we are so happy hi 
the midst of all our pleasures, you who are all powafid, 
you who are so beautiful?" 

At first she made no answer, but when he insisted^ she 
sighed and said: "Alas! one always ends by sufifering die 



CATULLE MEND&S 313 

evil that one has inflicted on others. Alas! I am sad be> 
cause you have never told me: 'I love you.' " 

He did not pronoimce the words, but uttered a cry of 
joy at having found again the end of his poem. In vain 
the fairy attempted to retain him in the blue and rose-dia- 
mond grottos, in the gardens of lilies that were as luminous 
as the stars. He returned to earth, completed, wrote and 
published his ode, in which the men and women of the af- 
flicted country found again the divine words they had lost. 

Now there were rendezvous again in the lanes, and warm, 
amorous conversations at the conjugal windows. 

It is because of poetry that kisses are sweet, and lovers 
say nothing that the poets have not sung. 



THE PROCURATOR OF JUDEA 

(Le Procurateur de Judie) 
By ANATOLE FRANCE 

L^LIUS LAMIA, bom in Italy of illustrious parents, 
had not yet discarded the toga prcetexta when he set 
out for the schools of Athens to study philosophy. 
Subsequently he took up his residence at Rome, and in hia 
house on the Esquiline, amid a circle of youthful wastrels, 
abandoned himself to licentious courses. But being accused 
of engaging in criminal relations with Lepida, the wife of 
Sulpicius Quirinus, a man of consular rank, and being found 
guilty, he was exiled by Tiberius Caesar. At that time he 
was just entering his twenty-fourth year. During the ei^ 
teen years that his exile lasted he traversed Syria, Palestine, 
Cappadocia, and Armenia, and made prolonged visits to 
Antioch, Csesarea, and Jerusalem. When, after the death 
of Tiberius, Caius was raised to the purple. Lamia obtained 
permission to return to Rome. He even regained a por- 
tion of his possessions. Adversity had taught him wisdom. 
He avoided all intercourse with the wives and daughters 
of Roman citizens, made no efforts toward obtaining oflke, 
held aloof from public honours, and lived a secluded life in 
his house on the Esquiline. Occupying himself with the 
task of recording all the remarkable things he had seen during 
his distant travels, he turned, as he said, the vicissitudes of 
fais years of expiation into a diversion for his hours of rest. 
In the midst of these calm enjoyments, alternating with 
assiduous study of the works of Epicurus, he recognized 
with : mixture of surprise and vexation that age was stealing 

Translated by Frederick Chapman. 



ANATOLE PRANCE 315 

upon him. In his sixty-second year, being afflicted with an 
illness which proved in no slight degree troublesome, he 
decided to have recourse to the waters at Baiae. The coast 
at that point, once frequented by the halcyon, was at this 
date the resort of the wealthy Roman, greedy of pleasure. 
For a week Lamia lived alone, without a friend in the bril- 
liant crowd. Then one day, after dinner, an inclination to 
which he yielded urged him to ascend the inclines, which, 
covered with vines that resembled bacchantes, looked out 
upon the waves. 

Having reached the simimit he seated himself by the side 
of a path beneath a terebinth, and let his glances wander 
over the lovely landscape. To his left, Bvid and bare, the 
Fhlegrsean plain stretched out towards the ruins of Cumse. 
On. his right, Cape Misenum plunged its abrupt spur be- 
neath the Tyrrhenian sea. Beneath his feet luxurious Bate, 
following the graceful outline of the coast, displayed its gar- 
dens, its villas thronged with statues, its porticos, its marble 
terraces along the shores of the blue ocean where the dol- 
phins sported. Before him, on the other side of the bay, 
on the Campanian coast, gilded by the already sinking sun, 
gleamed the temples whidh far away rose above the laurels 
of Posilippo, whilst on the extreme horizon Vesuvius looked 
forth smiling. 

Lamia dre.v from a fold of his toga a scroll containing 
the Treatise upon Nature, extended himself upon the ground, 
and began to read. But the warning cries of a slave neces- 
sitated his rising to allow of the passage of a litter which 
was being carried along the narrow pathway through the 
vineyards. The litter being imcurtained, permitted Lamia 
to see stretched upon the cushions as it was borne nearer 
to him the figure of an elderly man of immense bulk, who, 
supporting his head on his hand, gazed out with a gloomy 
and disdainful expression. His nose, which was aquiline, 
and his chin, which was prominent, seemed desirous of meet- 
ing across his lips, and his jaws were powerful. 

From the first moment Lamia was convinced that the face 
was familiar to him. He hesitate a mom^t before the 



3i6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

name came to him. Then suddenly hastwiing towanb the 
Utter with a display of surprise and ddi^t — 

'Tontius Pilate!" he cried. "The gpds be praised lAo 
have permitted me to see you once again 1" 

The old man gave a signal to the slaves to stop, aid 
cast a keen glance upon the stranger who had addressed Uffl. 

'Tontius, my dear host," resumed the latter, *^have tmtj 
years so far vrhitened my hair and hollowed my cbeds flat 
vou no longer recosnise vour friend .£lius Lamia?" 

At this name Pontius Pilate dismounted from the litter 
as actively as the weight of his years and the heaviness rf 
his gait permitted him, and onbraced .£lius Lamia agVB 
and again. 

''Gods! what a treat it is to me to see you once morel 
But, alas, you call up memories of those long-vamsbed d^s 
when I was Procurator of Judsea, in the province of Syu 
Wliy, it must be thirty years ago that I first met yoD. It 
was at Csesarea, whither you came to drag out your weny 
term of exile. I was fortunate enough to alleviate it i 
little, and out of frien^^ship, Lamia, you followed me to tint 
depressing place Jerusalem, where ihe Jews filled me wA 
bitterness and disgust. You remained for more than ta 
years my guest and my companion, and in converse aboot 
Rcime ar.d tilings Roman we both of us managed to isi 
con:c/iutlon — you for ycid misforttmes, and 1 far my bn- 
dens of State." 

Lamia embraced him afresh. 

''You forget two things, Pontius; you are overlodking tk 
facts that you used your influence on my behalf with Hood 
Antipas, and that your purse was freely open to me." 

*'Lct us not talk of that," replied Pontius, "since aflff 
your return to Rome you sent me by one of your freedma 
a sum of mone}' which repaid me with usury." 

^Tontius, I could never consider myself out of your debt 
b}' the mere payment of money. But tell me, have the §A 
fulfilled your desires? Are you m the enjoyment of all tk 
happiness you deserx'e? Tell me about your family, yot 
fortunes, your health." 

"I have withdrawn to Sicily, where I possess Mt atif H Ml 



ANATOLE FRANCE 317 

^ere I cultivate wheat for tbe market. My eldest dau^- 
ter, my best-beloved Pontia, who has been left a widow, 
lives with me, and directs my household. The gods be 
praised, I have preserved my mental vigour; my memory 
is not in the least degree enfeebled. But old age always 
brings in its train a long procession of griefs and infirmities. 
I am cruelly tormented with gout. And at this very mo- 
ment you find me on my way to the Phlegraean plain in 
search of a remedy for my sufferings. From that burning 
soil, whence at night flames burst forth, proceed acrid ex- 
halations of sulphiu", which, so they say, ease the pains and 
restore suppleness to the stiffened joints. At least, the 
physicians assure me that it is so." 

"May you find it so in your case, PontiusI But, despite 
the gout and its burning torments, you scarcely look as old 
as myself, although in reality you must be my senior by 
ten years. Unmistakably you have retained a greater degree 
of vigour than I ever possessed, and I am overjoyed to find 
you looking so hale. Why, dear friend, did you retire from 
the public service before the customary age? Why, on re- 
signing your governorship in Judaea, did you withdraw to 
a voluntary exile on your Sicilian estates? Give me an 
account of your doings from the moment that I ceased to 
be a witness of them. You were preparing to suppress a 
Samaritan rising when I set out for Cappadocia, where I 
hoped to draw some profit from the breeding of horses and 
mules. I have not seen you since then. How did that 
expedition succeed? Pray tell me. Everything interests 
me that concerns you in any way." 

Pontius Pilate sadly shook his head. 

"My natural disposition," he said, "as well as a sense 
of duty, impelled me to fulfil my public responsibilities, not 
merely with diligence, but even with ardour. But I was 
pursued by unrelenting hatred. Intrigues and calumnies 
cut short my career in its prime, and the fruit it should have 
look to bear has withered away. You ask me about the 
Samaritan insurrection. Let us sit down on this hillock. 
I shall be able to give you an answer in few words. These 



3i8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

bccurrences are as vividly present to me as if Acy bad Yaf' 

pened yesterday. 

''A man of the people, of persuasive speech — diae aie 
many ^uch to be met with in Syria — indooed the Saan* 
tanis to gather together in arms cm Mount Gcrizim (viddi 
ir. that country is looked upon as a holy place) imder die 
[.•romi^e that he would disclose to thdr si^t the SKied 
vciuels v.hich in the ancient days of Evander and our fidiff, 
y7->jea3. had been hidden a'^ay by an qxmymoas hero, or 
rather a tribal deity, named Moses. Upon this assorsDce 
the Samaritans rose in rebellion; but ha\ing been wamed 
in time to forestall them, I dispatched detadunents ci in- 
fantry to occupy the moimtain, and stationed cavahy Id 
keep the approaches to it imder observation. 

"1 hf:;-c measures of prudence were urgenL Tlie rdxb 
were already laying siege to the town of Tjrrathaha, atnatod 
at the foot of Moimt Gcrizim. I eaaly di^)ersed them, and 
.stiikfl the as yet scarcely organized revolt Then, in adff 
to give a forcible example with as few victims as powdbl^ I 
handed over to execution the leaders of the rebeUiim. Btt 
you are a\varc, Lamia, in what strait dependence I was kqit 
by the proconsul Vitellius, who governed Syria not in, 
but against the interests of Rome, and looked upcm da 
province:^ of the empire as territories which cotdd be iaiincd 
out to tetrarchs. The head men among the Samaritsm; 
Jn th(;ir resentment against me, came and fell at his M 
lament iiiir. To listen to them, nothing had been furfliff 
from rlieir thoup:hts than to disobey Caesar. It was I lAo 
hal ))rovr>ke(l the rising, and it was purely in order to wifr 
sttJid my violence that they had gathered together arooDil 
Tyrathaha. Vitellius listened to their complaints^ and 
handing rvcr the affairs of Judsa to his friend MarcdlB% 
commanrlcfl me to go and justify my proceedings before tte 
Emperor himself. With a heart overflowing with grief and 
resentment I took ship. Just as I approached die shoro 
of Italy, Tiberius, worn out with age and the cares of €01* 
pire, died suddenly on the self-same Cape Misenum, whose 
peak we see from this very spot magnified in the mfcrt a of 
evening. I demanded justice of Caius, his successor, whose 



ANA TOLE FRANCE 3 19 

paxreption was naturally acute, and who was acquainted 
with Syrian affairs. But marvel with me, Lamia, at the 
maliciousness of fortune, resolved on my discomfitiure. 
Caius then had in his suite at Rome the Jew Agrippa, his 
tompanion, the friend of his childhood, whom he cherished 
as his own eyes. Now Agrippa favoiured Vitdlius, inasmuch 
as Vitellius was the enemy of Antipas, whom Agrippa piur- 
sued with his hatred. The Emperor adopted the prejudices 
of his beloved Asiatic, and refused even to listen to me. 
There was nothing for me to do but bow beneath the stroke 
of unmerited misfortune. With tears for my meat and gall 
for my portion, I withdrew to my estates in Sicily, where I 
should have died of grief if my sweet Pontia had not come 
to console her father. I have cultivated wheat, and suc- 
ceeded in producing the fullest ears in the whole province. 
But now my life is ended; the futiu'e will judge between 
Vitellius and me." 

"Pontius," replied Lamia, "I am persuaded that you acted 
towards the Samaritans according to the rectitude of your 
character, and solely in the interests of Rome. But were 
you not perchance on that occasion a trifle too much in- 
fluenced by that impetuous courage which has always swayed 
you? You will remember that in Judaea it often happened 
that I who, younger than you, should naturally have been 
more impetuous than you, was obliged to urge you to 
clemency and suavity." 

"Suavity towards the Jews!" cried Pontius Pilate. "Al- 
though you have lived amongst them, it seems dear that 
you ill understand those enemies of the hiunan race. 
Haughty and at the same time base, combining an invincible 
obstinacy with a despicably mean spirit, they weary alike 
your love and your hatred. My character. Lamia, was 
formed upon the maxims of the divine Augustus. When I 
was appointed Procurator of Judaea, the world was already 
penetrated with the majestic ideal of the pax romana. No 
longer, as in the days of our internecine strife, were we wit- 
nesses to the sack of a province for the aggrandisement of 
a proconsul. I knew where my duty lay. 1 was careful . 
that my actions should be governed by prudence and mod- 



320 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

eratlon. Tae gods are my witnesses that I was resolved 
up«:Q rrjldness. and upon mildness only. Yet wiiat did my 
benevolent intendons avail me? You ware at my side, 
Lamia, v.hen, at the outset of my career as nder, & fiist 
rebe!.::ri can?.e to a head. Is there any need for me to 
recall tlie details to you? The garrison had been trans- 
ferred ircm Cssarea to take up its winter quarters at Jen- 
Solem. L'pon the ensigns of the legionaries appeared the 
pre5er-:ri2".t cf Cssar. The inhabitants of Jerusalem, lAo 
did r.:: Tccrrznlze the indwelling divinity of the Enqxrar, 
\Tcre scandalized at this, as though, when obedience is com- 
pul5«:r-. i: were not less abject to obey a god than a man. 
The prieits of their nation appeared before my tribunal 
inip'cr'r:: me with supercilious humility to have the en^gni 
remr veci from within the holy city. Out of reverence for the 
divine nature of Csesar and the majesty of the empire, I 
refused to comply. Tnen the rabble made conmoon cause 
with t/.e priests, and all around the pretorium portentous 
cries cf supplication arose. I ordered the soldiers to stack 
their spears in front cf the tower of Antonia, and to pro- 
ceed, armed only with sticks like lictors, to di^)erae the 
insolent crowd. But. heedless of blows, the Jews contimied 
their entreaties, and the more obstinate amongst them threw 
themselves on the ground and, exposing their throats to the 
rods, deliberately courted death. You were a witness of 
my humiliation on that occasion. Lamia. By the order of 
ViteIIiu> 1 was forced to send the insignia back to Caesaiea. 
That disgrace I had certainly not merited. Before the 
immortal i;ods I swear that never once during my term of i 
office did I flout justice and the laws. But I am grown 
old. yiy enemies and detractors are dead. I shall de 
unavenp;ed. Who will not retrieve my character?" 
He moaned and lapsed into silence. Lamia replied: 
"That man is prudent who neither hopes nor fears an]^ 
thin^ from the uncertain events of the future. Does it mat- 
ter in the least what estimate men may form of us her^ 
after? We ourselves are after all our own witnesses^ and 
our own jud.G;es. You must rely, Pontius Pilate, on the 
testimony you yourself bear to your own rectitude. Be oon- 



ANATOLE FRANCE 321 

tent with your own personal respect and that of yotur friends. 
For the rest, we know that mildness by itself will not suffice 
for the work of government. There is but little room in the 
actions of public men for that indulgence of human frailty 
which the philosophers recommend." 

"Well say no more at present," said Pontius. "The sul- 
phurous fumes which rise from the Phlegraean plain are more 
powerful when the ground which exhales them is still warm 
beneath the sun's rays. I must hasten on. Adieu! But 
now that I have rediscovered a friend, I should wish to take 
advantage of my good fortime. Do me the favour, iEliua 
Lamia, to give me your company at supper at my house 
to-morrow. My house stands on the seashore, at the ex- 
treme end of the town in the direction of Misenum. You 
will easily recognize it by the porch, which bears a paint- 
ing representing Orpheus surroimded by tigers and lions, 
whom he is charming with the strains from his lyre. 

"Till to-morrow. Lamia," he repeated, as he climbed once 
more into his litter. "To-morrow we will talk about Judaea." 

The following day at the supper hour Lamia presented him- 
self at the house of Pontius Pilate. Two couches only were 
in readiness for occupants. Creditably but simply equipped, 
the table held a silver service in which were set out becca- 
ficos in honey, thrushes, oysters from the Lucrine lake, and 
lampreys from Sicily. As they proceeded with their repast, 
Pontius and Lamia interchanged inquiries with one another 
about their ailments, the symptoms of which they described 
at considerable length, mutually emulous of communicating 
the various remedies which had been recommended to them. 
Then, congratulating themselves on being thrown together 
once more at Baiae, they vied with one another in praise 
of the beauty of that enchantmg coast and the mildness of 
the climate they enjoyed. Lamia was enthusiastic about 
the charms of die courtesans who frequented the seashore 
laden with golden ornaments and trailing draperies of bar- 
baric broidery. But the aged Procurator deplored the os- 
tentation with which by means of trumpery jewels and filmy 
garments foreigners and even enemies of the empire bes^uiled 
file Romans oif their gold. After a time they turned to the 



322 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

subject of the great engineering feats that had been accom- 
pli^ed m the country; the prodigious bridge constructed by 
Caius between Puteoli and Baiae, and the canals which Au- 
gustus excavated to convey the waters of the ocean to Lake 
Avemus and the Lucrine lake. 

"I also," said Pontius, with a sigh, '^I also wished to set 
afoot public works of great utility. When, for my sins, I 
was appointed Governor of Judaea, I conceived the idea of 
furnishing Jerusalem with an abundant supply of pure 
water by means of an aqueduct. The elevation of the 
levels, the proportionate capacity of the various parts, the 
gradient for the brazen reservoirs to which the distribution 
pipes were' to be fixed — I had gone into every detail, and 
decided everything for myself with the assistance of 
mechanical experts. I had drawn up regulations for the 
superintendents so as to prevent individuals from making 
unauthorized depredations. The architects and the work- 
men had their instructions. I gave orders for the commence- 
ment of operations. But far from viewing with satisfaction 
the construction of that conduit, which was intended to carry 
to their town upon its massive arches not only water but 
health, the inhabitants of Jerusalem gave vent to lamentable 
outcries. They gathered tumultuously togethef, exclaiming 
against the sacrilege and impiousness, and hurling them- 
selves upon the workmen, scattered the very foundation 
stones. Can you picture to yourself, Lamia, a filthier set 
of barbarians? Nevertheless, Vitellius decided in their 
favour, and I received orders to put a stop to the work." 

"It is a knotty point," said Lamia, "how far one is Jus- 
tified in devising things for the commonweal against the will 
of the populace." 

Pontius Pilate continued as though he had not heard this 
interruption. 

"Refuse an aqueduct! What madnessi But whatever 
is of Roman origin is distasteful to the Jews. In their eyes 
we are an unclean race, and our very presence ^q)ears a 
profanation to them. You will remember that they would 
never venture to enter the pretorium for fear of defiling 
themselves, and that I was consequently obliged to dis- 



ANATOLE PRANCE 323 

charge my magisterial functions in an open-air tribunal on 
that marble pavement your feet so often trod. 

"They fear us and they despise us. Yet is not Rome the 
mother and warden of all these peoples who nestle smiling 
upon her venerable bosom? With her eagles in the van^ 
peace and liberty have been carried to the very confines of 
the universe. Those whom we have subdued we look on 
as our friends, and we leave those conquered races, nay, we 
secure to them the permanence of their customs and their 
laws. Did Syria, aforetime rent asunder by its rabble of 
I)etty kings, ever even begin to taste of peace and pros- 
perity until it submitted to the armies of Pompey? And 
when Rome might have reaped a golden harvest as the 
price of her goodwill, did she lay hands on the hoards that 
swell the treasuries of barbaric temples? Did she deqx)il 
the shrine of Cybele at Pessinus, or the Morimene and 
Cilician sanctuaries of Jupiter, or the temple of the Jewish 
god at Jerusalem? Antioch, Palmyra, and Apamea, secure 
despite their wealth, and no longer in dread of the wandering 
Arab of the desert, have erected temples to the genius of 
Rome and the divine Caesar. The Jews alone hate and with- 
stand us. They withhold their tribute till it is wrested 
from them, and obstinately rebel against military service." 

"The Jews," replied Lamia, "are profoimdly attached to 
their ancient customs. They suspected you, unreasonably 
I admit, cf a desire to abolish their laws and change their 
usages. Do not resent it, Pontius, if I say that you did 
not always act in such a way as to disperse th^ir imfortunate 
illusion. It gratified you, despite your habitual self-re- 
straint, to play upon their fears, and more than once have 
I seen you betray in their presence the contempt with 
which their beliefs and religious ceremonies inspired you. 
You irritated them particularly by giving instructions for 
the sacredotal garments and ornaments of their high priest 
to be kept in ward by your legionaries in the Antonine 
tower. One must admit that though they have never risen 
like us to an appreciation of thinps divine, the Jews cele- 
brate rites which their very antiquity renders venerable." 

Pontius Pilate shrugged his shoulders. 



324 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"They have very little exact knowledge of tbe nature of 
the gods," he said. "They worship Jupiter, yet they ab- 
stain from naming him or erecting a statue of him. They 
do not even adore him under the semblance of a rude stone, 
as certain of the Asiatic peoples are wont to do. Th^ 
know nothing of Apollo, of Neptune, of Mars, nor of Fhito, 
nor of anv scddess. At the same time, I am convinced that 
in day? prone by they worshipped Venus. For even to this 
day their ^vomen bring doves to the altar as victims; and 
you know as well as I that the dealers who trade boieath 
the arcarles of their temple supply those birds in couples 
for 5vicrince. I have even been told that on one occasion 
some marlnan proceeded to overturn the stalls bearing 
these offerings, and their owners with them. The priests 
raised an outcry about it, and looked on it as a case of 
sacrilege. I am of opinion that their custom of sacrificing 
turtle-doves was instituted in honour of Venus. Why are 
you lauj);hinji, Lamia?" 

"I was laughing," said Lamia, "at an amusing idea which, 
I hardly know ho\Y, just occurred to me. I was thinking 
that perchance some day the Jupiter of the Jews mi^t 
come to Rome and vent his fury upon you. Why should 
he not? Asia and Africa have already enriched us with 
a considerable number of gods. We have seen temples in 
honour of Isis and the dog-faced Anubis erected in Rome. 
In the public squares, and e\'en on the race-courses, yon 
may run across the Bona Dea of the S3rrians moimted on an 
ass. And did you never hear how, in the reign of Tiberius, 
a youn^ patrician passed himself off as the homed Jupiter 
of the £<;yptians, Jupiter Ammon, and in this disguise pro- 
cured the favours of an illustrious lady who was too virtuous 
to deny anything to a god? Beware, Pontius, lest tiie in- 
visible Jupiter of the Jews disembark some day on the 
quay at ()stia!" 

At the idea of a god coming out of Judaea, a fleeting smile 
played over the severe countenance of the Procurator. Theo 
he replied gravely: 

'^How would the Jews manage to impose their sacred law 
on outside peoples when they are in a perpetual state of 



ANATOLE PRANCE 325 

tumult amongst themselves as to the interpretation of that 
law? You have seen them yourself, Lamia, in the public 
squares, ^lit up mto twenty rival parties, with staves. in 
their hands, abusing each other and clutching one another by 
the beard. You have seen them on the steps of the temple, 
tearing their filthy garments as a S3mibol of lamentation, 
with some wretched creature in a frenzy of prophetic exal- 
tation in their midst. They have never realized that it is 
possible to discuss peacefully and with an even mind those 
matters concerning the divine which yet are hidden from 
the profane and wrapped in uncertainty. For the nature 
of the immortal gods remains hidden from us, and we can- 
not arrive at a knowledge of it. Though I am of opinion, 
none the less, that it is a prudent thing to believe m the 
providence of the gods. But the Jews are devoid of philo- 
sophy, and cannot tolerate any diversity of opinions. On 
the contrary, they judge worthy of the extreme penolty all 
those who on divine subjects profess opinions opposed to 
their law. And as, since the genius of Rome has towered 
over them, capital sentences pronounced by their own tri- 
bunals can only be carried out with the sanction of the 
proconsul or the procurator, they harry the Roman magis- 
trate at any hour to procure his signature to their baleful 
decrees, they besiege the pretorium with their cries of 
'Death!' A hundred times, at least, have I known them, 
mustered, rich and poor together, all united under their 
priests, make a furious onslaught on my ivory chair, seizing 
me by the skirts of my robe, by the thongs of my sandals, 
and all to demand of me — nay, to exact from me — the death 
sentence on some imfortunate whose guilt I failed to per- 
ceive, and as to whom I could only pronounce that he was 
as mad as his accusers. A htmdred times, do I say! Not 
a hundred, but every day and all day. Yet it was my duty 
to execute their law as if it were ours, since I was appointed 
by Rome not for the destruction, but for the upholding of 
their customs, and over them I had the power of the rod 
and the axe. At the outset of my term of office I en- 
deavoured to persuade them to hear reason. I attempted 
to snatch their miserable victims from death. But this 



326 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

show of mildness only irritated them the more; they de- 
manded their prey, fighting aromid me like a horde of 
vultures with wing and beak. Their priests reported to 
Caesar that I was violating their law, and their appeals, sup- 
ported by Vitellius, drew down upon me a severe reprimand. 
How many times did I long, as the Greeks used to say, to 
dispatch accusers and accused in one convoy to the crows! 

''Do not imagine. Lamia, that I nourish the rancour of 
the discomfited, the wrath of the superannuated, against a 
people which in my person has prevailed against both Rome 
and tranquillity. But I foresee the extremity to which 
sooner or later they will reduce us. Smce we cannot gov- 
ern them, we shall be driven to destroy them. Never doubt 
it. Always in a state of insubordination, brewing rebellion 
in their inflammatory minds, they will one day burst forth 
upon us with a fury beside which the wrath of the Numidians 
and the mutterings of the Parthians are mere child's play. 
They are secretly nourishing preposterous hopes, and madly 
premeditating our ruin. How can it be otherwise, when, on 
the strength of an oracle, they are living in expectation of 
the coming of a prince of their own blood whose kingdom 
shall extend over the whole earth? There are no half 
measures with such a people. They must be exterminated. 
Jerusalem must be laid waste to the very foimdation. Per- 
chance, old as I am, it may be granted me to behold the 
day when her walls shall fall and the flames shall envelop 
her houses, when her inhabitants shall pass under the edge 
of the sword, when salt shall be strewn on the place where 
once the temple stood. And in that day I shall at length 
be justified." 

Lamia exerted himself to lead the conversation back to a 
less acrimonious note. 

"Pontius," he said, "it is not difficult for me to under- 
stand both your long-standing resentment and your sinister 
forebodings. Truly, what you have experienced of the char- 
acter of the Jews is nothing to their advantage. But I lived 
in Jerusalem as an interested onlooker, and mingled fredy 
with the people, and I succeeded in detecting certain 61>- 
^scure virtues in these rude folk which were altogether hid- 



ANATOLE PRANCE 327 

den from you. I have met Jews who were all mfldnesSy 
whose simple mamiers and faithfulness of heart recalled to 
me what our poets have related concerning the Spartan 
lawgiver. And you yourself, Pontius, have seen perish be- 
neaSi the cudgek of your legionaries simple-minded men 
friio have died for a cause they believed to be just without 
revealing their names. Such men do not deserve our con- 
tempt. I am saying this because it is desirable in all things 
to preserve moderation and an even mind. But I own that 
I never experienced any lively sjmtipathy for the Jews. The 
Jewess, on the contrary, I found extremely pleasing. I was 
young, then, and the Sjnian women stirred all my senses 
to reqx)nse. Their ruddy lips, their liquid eyes that shone 
in the shade, their sleepy gaze pierced me to the veiy mar- 
row. Painted and stained, smelling the nard and myrrh, 
steeped in odours, their ph3rsical attractions are both rare 
and delightful." 

Pontius listened impatiently to these praises. 

^^I was not the kind of man to fall into the snares of 
the Jewish women," he said; ''and since you have open^ 
the subject yourself. Lamia, I was never able to approve 
of your laxity. If I did not express with sufficient emphasis 
fonnerly hov; culpable I held you for having intrigued at 
Rome with the wife of a man of consular rank, it was be- 
cause you were then enduring heavy penance for your mis- 
doings. Marriage from the patrician point of view is a 
sacred tie; it is one of the institutions which are the sup- 
port of Rome. As to foreign women and slaves, such rela- 
tions as one may enter into with them would be of little 
account were it not that they habituate the body to a 
humiliating effeminacy. Let me tell you that you have been 
too liberal in your offerings to the Venus of the Market- 
place; and what, above all, I blame in you is that you have 
not married in compliance with the law and given children 
to the Republic, as every good citizen is bound to do." 

But the man who had suffered exile under Tiberius was 
no longer listening to the venerable magistrate. Having 
tossed off his cap of Falemian, he was smiling at some image 
visible to his eye alone. 



328 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

After a moment's silence he resumed in a very deep voioe^ 
which rose in pitch by little and little: 

"With what languorous grace they dance, those Syrian 
women! I knew a Jewess at Jerusalem who used to dance 
in a poky little room, on a threadbare carpet, by the light 
of one smoky little lamp, waving her arms as die clanged 
her cymbals. Her loms arched, her head thrown back, 
and, as it were, dragged down by the weight of her heavy 
red hair, her eyes swimming with voluptuousness, eager, 
languishing, compliant, she would have made Cleopatra 
herself grow pale with envy. I was in love with her bar- 
baric dances, her voice — a Uttle raucous and yet so sweet — 
her atmosphere of incense, the semi-somnolescent state in 
which she seemed to live. I followed her ever)rwhere. I 
mixed with the vile rabble of soldiers, conjurers, and extiNr- 
tioners with which she was surrounded. One day, however, 
she disappeared, and I saw her no more. Long did I sed^ 
her in disreputable alleys and taverns. It was more diffi- 
cult to learn to do without her than to lose the taste for 
Greek wine. Some months after I lost sight of her, I 
learned by chance that she had attached herself to a snaall 
company of men and women who were followers of a young 
Galilean thaumaturgist. His name was Jesus; he came from 
Nazareth, and he was crucified for some crime, I don't qiiite 
know what. Pontius, do you remember anything about the 
man?" 

Pontius Pilate contracted his brows, and his hand fose 
to his forehead in the attitude of one who probes the deeps 
of memory. Then after a silence of some seconds: 

"Jesus?" he murmured, "Jesus— of Nazareth? I cannot 
call him to mind." 



THE IDYL OF AN OLD COUPLE 

{La Chanson des Vieux &poux) 
By PIERRE LOTI 

TOTO-SAN and Kaka-San were husband and wife. 
They were old — so old; everybody had always known 
them; .he oldest people in Nagasaki did not even re- 
member the *time when they had seen them young. They 
begged in the streets. Toto-San, who was blind, dragged 
after him in a sort of small bath-chair Kaka-San, who was 
paralyzed. Formerly they were known as Hato-San and 
Oume-San (Monsieur Kgeon and Madame Prune), ^but 
the people no longer remembered this. In the Japanese 
language Toto and Kata are very soft words which signify 
"father" and "mother" in the mouths of children. Doubt- 
less because of their great age, everybody called them so; 
and in this land of excessive politeness they added to these 
familiar names the word "San," which is a word of cour- 
tesy like monsieur and madame {Monsieur Papa and Madame 
Maman), Even the smallest Japanese babies do not neg- 
lect these terms of politeness. Their method of begging 
was discrete and comme U faut. They did not harass the 
passers-by with prayers, but held out their hands simply 
and without sa)ang anything — poor hands, wrinkled and al- 
ready like those of a mummy. The people gave them rice, 
heads of fish, old soups. Very small, like all Japanese 
women, Kaka-San appeared reduced almost to nothing in 
this chair, in which her lower limbs, almost dead, had been 
dried up and huddled together for so many years. Her 
carriage was badly hung; and thus it came to be much 

Translated by T. P. O'Connor, M. P. Copyright, Cassell & Ca 

329 



330 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

jolted in the course of its journeys through the city. He 
did not walk very quickly, her poor husband, and he was 
so full of care and precaution. She guided him with her 
voice, and he, attentive, his ear pricked up, went on his 
way, like the Wandering Jew, in his everlasting darkness, 
the leather rein thrown over his shoulder and striking the 
ground with a bamboo cane to direct his steps. 

They went to all the religious festivals celebrated in the 
temples. Under the great black cedars, which shade the 
sacred meadows, at the foot of some old monster in granite, 
they installed themselves at an early hour before the arrival 
of the earliest devotees, and so long as the pilgrimage lasted, 
many of the passers-by stopped at their side. They were 
yoimg girls with the faces of dolls, and little eyes like cats, 
dragging after them their high boots of wood; Japanese 
children, very funny m their long parti-coloured dresses, 
arriving in bands to pay their devotions and holding each 
other by their hands; beautiful simpering ladies, with com- 
plicated chignons, going to the pagoda to pray and to lau^; 
peasants ^vith long hair. Bonzes or merchants, every imagin- 
able description of these gay little doll-people pas.sed before 
Kata-San, who still was able to see diem, and Toto-San, 
who was not. They always gave them a kind look, and 
sometimes somebody would detach himself from a group to 
give them some alms. Sometimes even they made tiiem 
bows, quite as if they were people of quality — so well wer* 
they known, and so polite is everybody in this Empure. 

In those days, it often happened that they could smQe 
at the feast when the weather was fine and the breeze soft, 
when the sorrows of old age slumbered a little in their 
exhausted limbs. Kaka-San, excited by the tumult of the 
laughing and light voices, began to simper like the passing 
ladies, playing with her poor fan of paper, assuming the 
air of one who still had something to say to life, and ^o 
interested herself like other people in the amusing tbingi 
of this world. 

But when evening came, bringing darkness and chQl un- 
der the cedars, when there was everywhere a sense of rdi- 
gious horror and mystery around the temples, in the allqrs 



PIERRE WTI 331 

lined with monsters, the old couple sank back on tbemsdves. 
It seemed as if the fatigues of the day had gnawed th(em 
from within; their wrinkles became deeper, their skin hung 
more loosely; their faces expressed only their fri^tful 
misery and the hideous idea of the nearness of death. 

Meantime, thousands of lamps were lit around them in 
the black branches; and the devout held their places on 
the steps of the temples. The hum of a gayety, at once 
Uvolous and strange, came from this crowd, nlled the ave- 
nues and the holy vaults, in sharp contrast with the sinister 
grin of the immobile monsters who guard the gods — with 
file frightful and imknown sjmtibols — ^with the vague terrors 
of the night. The feast was prolonged till daylight, and 
seemed an immense irony to, the spirits of heaven rather 
than an act of adoration; but an irony that had no bitter- 
ness, that was child-like amiable, and, above all things, 
irresistibly joyous. 

But this affected not the old couple. With the setting of 
the sun there was nothing which could animate any longer 
those human wrecks. They became sinister to look at; 
huddled up, apart from everybody else, like sick pariahs or 
old monkeys, worn out and done for, eating in a corner 
their poor little alms-offerings. At this moment were they 
disturbed by something profoimd and eternal, else why was 
there this expression of anguish on their death-masks? Who 
knows what passed in their old Japanese heads? Perhaps 
nothing at all. They struggled simply to keep on living; 
they ate with their little chop-sticks, helping each other 
tenderly. They covered each other up so as not to get 
cold and to keep the dew from penetrating to their bones. 
They took care of each other as much as they with the 
simple desire of being alive the next day, and of recommenc- 
ing their old wandering promenade, the one rolling the 
other's chair. In the little chair Kaka-San kept all their 
household effects, broken dishes of blue porcelain for their 
rice, little cups to drink their tea, and lanterns of red 
paper which they lit at night. 

Once every week, Kaka-San's hair was carefully combed 
and dressed by her beloved husband. Her arms she could 



332 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

not quite raise high enough to fix her Japanese chignon, and 
Toto-San had learned to do it instead. Trembling and 
fumbling, he caressed the poor old head, which allowed 
itself to be stroked with coquettish abandon, and the whole 
thing recalled — except that it was sadder — the toilette which 
the humbugs help each other to make. Her hair was thin; 
and Toto-San did not find much to comb on her poor 
yellow parchment, wrinkled like the skin of an apple in 
•winter. He succeeded, however, in fixing up her hair in 
puffs, after the Japanese fashion: and die, deeply inter- 
ested in the operation, followed it with her eyes in a broken 
piece of a mirror, with: "A little higher, Toto-San." "A 
little more to the right." "A little to the left." In the end, 
when he had stuck two long pins in, which gave to the 
coiffure its finishing touch, Kaka-San seemed to regain 
the air of a genteel grandmother, a profile like that of a 
well-bred woman. 

They also went through their ablutions conscientiously: 
for they are very clean in Japan. 

And when they had iini^ed these ablutions once more, 
which had been done so often already during so many years; 
when they had completed that toilette, which the approach 
of death rendered less grateful from day to day — did they 
feel themselves vivified by the pure and cold water? did they 
experience a little more comfort m the freshness of the 
morning? 

Ah! what a depth of wretchedness was theirs! After 
each night, to wake up both more infirm, more depressed, 
more shaky, and in spite of it all, to wish obstinately to 
live on, to display their decrepitude to the sun, and to set 
out in the same eternal promenade in their bath-chair; vAtik 
the same long pauses, the same creaks of the wood, the same 
joltings, the same fatigue; to pass even throu^ the streets^ 
into the suburbs, through the valleys, even to the distant 
country where a festival was annoimced in some tempie in 
the woods. 

It was m the fields one mommg, at the crossing of two 
of the Royal roads, that death suddenly caught old Kaki- 
San. It was a beautiful morning in ^ril; the sun wu 



PIERRE WTI 333 

shining brightly, and the grass was very green. In the 
island of Kiu-Tiu the spring is a little warmer than ours, 
comes earlier, and already everything was resplendent in the 
fertile fields. The two roads crossed each other in the midst 
of the fields; all around was the rice-crop glistening imder 
the light breeze in innumerable changes of colour. The air 
was filled with the music of the grasshoppers, which in Japan 
are loud in their buzz. At this spot were about ten tombs 
in the grass under a bunch of large and isolated cedars. 
Square stone pillars, or ancient Buddhas in granite, were 
set up in the cups of the lotus. Beyond the fields of rice, 
you saw the woods, not unlike our wood of oak. But here 
and there were white or rose-coloured clumps, which were 
the camelias in flower, and the light foliage of the bamboos. 
Then farther off were the mountains, resembling small domes 
with little cupolas, forming against the sky shapes that 
seemed artificial, yet very agreeable. 

It was in the midst of this region of calm and verdure 
that the chair of Kaka-San stopped, and for a halt that was 
to be its last. Peasants, men and woman, dressed in their 
long dresses of dark blue cotton with pagoda sleeves — about 
twenty good little Japanese souls — hurried to the bath-chair 
where the old dying woman was convulsively twisting her 
old arms. She had had a stroke quite suddenly while being 
drawn along by Toto-San on a pilgrimage to the temple 
of the goddess Kwanon. 

They, good souls, did their best, attracted by sympathy 
as much as by curiosity, to help the old woman. They 
were for the most part people who, like her, were making 
their way to the feast of Kwanon, the Goddess of Beauty. 
Poor Kaka-San! They attempted to restore her with a 
cordial made of rice brandy; they rubbed the pit of her 
stomach with aromatic herbs, and bathed the back of her 
neck with the fresh water of a stream. Toto-San touched 
her quite gently, caressed her timidly, not knowing what 
to do, embarrassing the others with his awkward blind move- 
ments, and trembling with anguish in all his limbs. 

Finally, they made her swsdlow, in smsJT pellets, pieces 
of paper which contained efficacious prayers written on them 



334 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

by the Bonzes, and which a helpful woman had consented 
to take from the linmg of her own sleeves. Labour m vainl 
for the hour had struck. Death was there, mvisible, lau^ 
ing in the face of all these good Japanese, and holcUng tiie 
old woman tight in his secure hands. 

A last painful convulsion and Kaka-San was dead. Her 
mouth lay open, her body all on one ^de, half fallen oat 
of the chair, and her arms hanging like the doll of a poor 
Punch and Judy show, which is allowed to rest at the dose 
of the performance. 

This little shaded cemetery, before which the final scene 
had taken place, seemed to be indicated by the Spirits 
themselves, and even to have been chosen by the dead 
woman herself. They made no delay. They hired some 
coolies who were passing, and very quickly they began to 
dig out the earth. Everybody was in a hurry, not ^^ishing 
to miss the pilgrimage nor to leave this poor old thing 
without burial — the more so as the day promised to be 
very hot, and already some ugly flies were gathering round. 
In half an hour the grave was ready. They took the old 
woman from her chair, lifting her by the shoulders, and 
placed her in the earth, seated as she had always been, ho* 
lower limbs huddled together as they had been in life — 
like one of those dried-up monkeys which sportsmen meet 
sometimes at the foot of trees in the forest. Toto-San tried 
to do everything himself, no longer in his right senses, and 
hindering the coolies, who have not sensitive hearts, and 
who hustled him about. He groaned like a little child, and 
tears ran from his eyes without exciting any att^tion. He 
tried to find out if at least her hair was properly combed 
to present herself in the eternal dwellings, if the bows of 
her hair were in order, and he wished to replace the large 
pins in her head-dress before they threw the earth over h». 

They heard a slight groanmg in the foliage; it was the 
spirits of Kaka-San's ancestors who had come to receive 
her on her entrance into the Country of Shadows. Toto- 
San yoked himself to the bath-chair once more; once more 
started out, from the sheer habit of walking and of draining 



PIERRE LOTI 335 

something after him. Separated from her who had been his 
friend, adviser, his intelligence and his eyes, he went about 
without thou^t, a mournful wreck, irrevocably alone on 
earth to the very end, no longer cabbie of collecting his 
thoughts, moving timidly without object and without hope, 
in nig^t blacker than ever before. In the meantime the 
gns£apptTs sang at their shrillest in the grass, which dark- 
ened under the stars; and whilst real night gathered around 
the old blind man, one heard already in the branches the 
same groanings as earlier while the burial was taking place. 
They were the murmurs of the spirits who said: '^Console 
thyself, Toto-San. She rests in a very sweet sort of anni- 
hilation vAere we also are and whither thou com'st soon. 
She is no longer old nor tottering, for she is dead; nor u^y 
to look upon, since she is hidden in the roots underground; 
nor disgusting to anybody, since she has become the fer- 
tilizing substance of the land. Her body will be purified, 
permeating the earth; Kaka-San will live again in beautiful 
Ji^Mnese plants; in the branches of the cedar, in the beau* 
tiful camcdias— in the bamboo." 



ATTITUDES 

(Les Gestes) 
By PAUL BOURGET 



T X THEN Madame Izelin had ^anced at (he card iivbidi 

\/\/ the concierge of the hotel handed her, together with 

^ ^ her letters, and had read thereon the name of Luden 
Salvan, her usually thoughtful and reserved face, of a woman 
of forty-five, expressed a surprise almost violent enough to 
be called a shock; and she at once slipped the card into the 
guide-book that she held in her hand, fearing lest her dau^-* 
ter Jeanne, who had lingered to select some flowers outside 
the door, might question her. But even when the latter 
appeared, bringing a handful of fresh primroses, those fresh 
Neapolitan primroses with which the sellers of bouquets be- 
siege one's carriage-door in Naples, — and beautifully did 
they harmonise with her blonde grace, — the mother had not 
yet entirely recovered her composure, and the girl asked: — 

^'But what is the matter, mamma? Have you had bad 
news?" 

^'I have not even looked at my letters,*' Madame Izelin 
said, forcing a smile, while Jeanne resumed, with solicitude 
in her voice and an anxiety in her blue eyes which seined 
to reveal the most exalted affection: — 

^^If you're not well, let us get back to Paris as soon as 
possible, and give up Rome and Florence. Do not thJnk of 
me. Think of yourself. Your health is my very life to me. 

Translated by William Marchant. Copyright, igo2, by Charles 
Scribner's Sons. 

336 



PAUL BOURGET 337 

I love art passionately, but I love you more than I do 
Michelangelo or Raphael." 

"I am perfectly well," the mother replied, with a kind of 
vexation, as if the daughter's tone in the inquiry about her 
health — a tone so affectionate it seemed — had displeased 
her. "Tiensf here is a letter from your cousin Julie," she 
continued, after having looked at the different addresses. 
And while Jeanne took the envelope and tore it open with 
a joyous curiosity now upon her expressive face, the mother 
continued to examine her closely with a singular look, and 
held tight in her hand the book containing the visiting card 
which had so deeply agitated her. 

They had entered the lift, which was now slowly ascend- 
ing toward the fourth floor, where they had their rooms. 
The young girl kept on reading her letter, interrupting it 
by commentaries addressed to her companion: — 

"They have had a grand ball at the Le Prieux', mamma; 
Julie writes that it was very amusing. There is talk of 
Edgard Faucherot's marriage to Jacqueline Lounet. They 
are going to wear boleros very short this season, it seems. 
What luck for me — with my figure!" 

"No," the mother said, five minutes later, when, alone 
in her room, she was again free to give herself up to the 
thoughts that the sight of the name engraved upon the card 
had awakened in her, "it is not possible that she has any- 
thing to do with this young man's coming here. All her let- 
ters pass through my hands. Besides, does she care for 
him? Does she' care for anything but herself, and to pro- 
duce an effect? Just now she had the air of being concerned 
about my health. If any one had seen her, in the hall, ask- 
ing me, with those eyes, with that voice, *Is anything the 
matter with you, mamma?' he would have believed that she 
was anxious that she loved me. *Do not think of me!' she 
said, speaking of Rome and Florence; and she spoke of 
Michelangelo and Raphael! She, who looks at nothing and 
feels nothing!" 

Then, continuing her inward monologue: "Is it her fault? 
And have I the right to be vexed with her when I know so 
well that she inherits this frightful fault, this lack of truth, 



338 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

this eternal playing a part? And am I just? Tt is her 
way of feeling. Alas! I have seen too often, with her fatho", 
what it all leads to, — this taste for attitude and effect, — 
to what egotism, to what falsehood! I did not see it when 
I married him, any more than this unlucky young man sees 
the character of Jeanne! How he loves her — ^that he ^could 
not endure our departure! If he knew that she has not 
j^ken of him once, that she has not given him a moment's 
thought! It must be of his own accord that he came, that 
he discovered where we were! How he loves herl The poor 
lad!" 

She had taken out the card from the guide-book, as she 
sat reflecting thus, and spelled out with her eyes the name 
of the young man on whose account she had hurriedly, five 
weeks before, carried her daughter off from Paris, first to 
Sicily and then to Naples, impelled by impressions and 
scruples which made part of the deep history of her life. 
What this life had been, and through how many sad hoturs 
it had passed, the premature gray of her hair, the prema- 
turely wrinkled eyelids plainly told. She must have been 
pretty, very differently from her daughter, with somethfaig 
modest, timid, retiring, in her appearance. Her features, 
bearing the impress of age, remained extremely delicate. 
She still had beautiful tee5i, beautiful eyes that were very 
soft, which sometimes, — too rarely, — when she smiled 
frankly lighted up with a youthful, and almost childish^ 
splendour. The half-mourning, which she had not laid aside, 
after two years of widowhood, made her colouring look like 
ivory. Her figure remained lender and lithe; and, thougjh 
she had not a drop of noble blood in her veins, — ^her father, 
whose very plebeian name was Dupuis, had made his for- 
tune as a wholesale dealer in wood at Bercy, — ^her feet and 
hands would have caused envy to more than one authentic 
duchess. With this she also had, as it were diffused over all 
her person, that indefinable melancholy of women who have 
never been loved. 

If her daughter, at that moment occupied in the next room 
in arranging her flowers in her vases, while going over in a 
half-voice a Neapolitan song, destined to be endlessly re- 



PAUL BOURGET 339 

peated, with piano accompaniment, in Paris, had opened the 
door a crack, and studied, in the verity of her e3q[)ression, 
this mother whom she a£fected to love so much, possibly a 
true emotion might for once have seized her, on sedng how 
much this face, habitually so fatigued, had grown sadder 
still while she turned over and over in her slender fingers 
the supple oblong of pasteboard. 

The splendid landscape visible through the window — ^ihat 
Bay of Naples with its soft curves, the purity of its sky 
and water, the graceful sweep of its volcano, its bright- 
coloured cities along its luminous shore, its sails so white 
upon its sea so blue — gave to this face of an anxious woman 
a setting which still further increased its pathetic expres- 
sion. At last, and as if awaking from a very sad dream, 
the widow passed her hand over her eyes; she ^ghed heavily, 
and looked at the clock. It was now quarter to twelve. 
Breakfast would be served at half-past twelve. She un- 
locked a drawer and took out her writing-case, wherem lay 
a letter already partly written, very long, and evidently 
taken up from time to time; she re-read it, now and then 
shaking her head, as with a feeling of the usdessness of 
what she had written; and, after assuring herself that her 
daughter, now also herself seated at a table in the adjacent 
room and about to write up the journal of her so-called 
"impressions of travel," would prbably not interrupt her, 
she returned to go on with this letter, written to the only 
one of her friends to whom she gave her complete confidence. 
These pages will explain, better than any commentary, both 
the nature of the relations between this woman and this 
girl, and the singular moral tragedy of her own life in 
which the presence of Lucien Salvan at Naples and his call 
at the hotel made a novel and decisive episode. 

Naples, March 17, 1897. 

Your reproaches, my dear friend, on the subject of my 
long silence touch me. To have the heart's second sight, as 
you have it toward me, your friendship for me must be 
very strong — strong even to the extent of being a little un- 
just. But it is a sweet injustice. One has need sometimes 



340 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

to feel one's self loved too much, loved with a sensitiveaess 
unknown to lukewarm affections. You know whether I have 
been over-indulged in this regard. Know also, know al- 
ways, Aat I appreciate your sympathy as it deserves. For- 
tunate as you are in your husband, your children, your 
grandchildren, that you should have been interested, as you 
have been, in a solitary woman, who was but an acquaint- 
ance, is the proof of a tender-heartedness for which it would- 
be inhuman in me to be imgrateful. 

I am not so, be assured; and if I left Paris without see- 
ing you, without talking over with you the plan of this 
journey about which you express anxiety, it was because 
certain griefs are shy in their nature, even toward — e^jeci- 
ally toward — friends whose esteem one would carefully avoid 
alienating from other persons. You understand from these 
few words that my poor Jeanne is concerned in this resolu- 
tion which I suddenly formed of leaving home for an ab- 
sence of some weeks, perhaps months. But do not hastily 
suppose that the child has done an3rthing deserving of blame. 
There are moments when I ask myself if it is not I who am 
in fault, and whether I have truly fulfilled toward ,her, in 
this affair, a mother's duty. But could I better respond 
to your tender solicitude, dear friend, than by making you 
yourself the judge of the troubles through which I have 
passed, of the reflections resulting from them, and of the 
method by which I have escaped from a difficulty which, 
whatever its cause may have been, is now so probably a 
thing of the past that what I write you is merely retro^)ec- 
tive history. Still, I intend to relate it to you, thou^ at 
the risk of repeating things in regard to whidi I have often . 
talked with you before. Do not expect anything extraor-' 
dinary. Who is it that says, "Dramas of the heart have 
no events?" 

We have so often spoken of my daughter that I do not 
need to tell you that my difficulty again arises from the 
peculiarity of my relations with her. Permit me to recall 
them to you, so that the whole may be clear and definite in 
your mind. To do this will be a solace, while it also wOl 
cause me pain. 



PAUL BOURGET 341 

You knew her father, and you know what the martyrdom 
of my life with him was. God forbid that I should ever 
confi^ a child, all inexperience, all simplicity, with a man 
so deeply, so thoroughly corrupt. That Monsieur Izelin 
married me solely for my fortune; that he never had in his 
heart the shadow of a shade of a£fection for me, while I, 
<m my part, gave myself to him with a passion of which 
this day's lament — ^after so many years, after death — is still 
a proof; that he betrayed me, exploited, humiliated, crushed 
me — I should be guilty indeed if I felt ill-will toward his 
daughter on this account, and threw upon her the responsi- 
bility for a resemblance which is no fault of hers! That 
she has his eyes^ his hair, his colouring, his gestures, his 
voice — that I find again in her, under a feminine form, that 
grace of trait and manner by which I was so foolishly caught 
— would be only a reason for loving her better — in memory 
of my past illusions! But the resemblance, as I have often 
said to you, goes much farther. I have also explained to 
you how the misery of my married life was less in the ac- 
tions which made me their victim than in the states of feel- 
ing that they manifested. Monsieur Izelin might have beoi 
even more faithless and more brutal than he was, I should 
have been less unhappy had he not kept, through all his 
faults, that faculty of simulation which deceived so many 
people, as it had deceived me when I was very young; which, 
at first, deceived even yourself, the acutest mind, the best 
•ndowed with discernment that I know. You remember, 
too, how this man, so selfish and hard, always had the right 
words to say, the right attitude to assume, in relation to 
whatever came up; how he excelled in the impersonation 
of scrupulousness! If a story of villany were related in his 
presence, how he grew indignant; or some noble act, how he 
admired it! If the talk was of a book, a picture, a play, 
how fine and pure his taste appeared! If a character were 
discussed, how he was indulgent or severe, with an equity 
which gave those who heard him the idea of conscience so 
lofty, so wise! This simulation was of all my miseries the 
worst. It was from a horror of this false show that I 
formed that habit of reserve with which you have sometimes 



342 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

reproached me, that difficulty in giving expression to my own 
feelings, that aversion from every manifested emotion, which 
you have at times regarded as coldness. I had suffered 
too much from that duality of my husband not to mistrust, 
everjrwhere and always, that which once you called — ^using 
a word that I have not forgotten — attitudes of the soul. 
One can a^ume them so often, so gracefully, so appropri- 
ately, and feel so little! 

It was only late in his life that you met Monsieur Izelin, 
at a time when this gift of conceiving and expressing refined 
feelings, without experiencing them at all, had become a 
frightful, a criminal hypocrisy, serving to hide under a noble 
exterior a frightful degradation of diaracter. It had not 
always been so. Even in the earliest days of our married 
life, while he was for me an absolutely blameless husband, I 
began to notice this complete, radical divorce in him between 
feeling and expression, this instinct for pose, which made him 
involuntarily, without effort, by a sort of irresistible his- 
trionic inclination, assume a certain character for the pur- 
pose of producing a desired effect. Before being an actor 
witii an end to gain, he was an actor for the mere pleasure 
of it. And why? In describing to you, yet again, this char- 
acter, of which I made, to my cost, so prolonged a study, I 
am still incapable of answering this question. Is there, in 
some natures, an inner aridness whidi incapacitates them 
for any deep, simple, genuine emotion, and with it an imagi- 
native power which makes them believe that they feel, and 
so they trick themselves first, and, later, others? And then, 
do these insincere, complicated natures let themselves be 
carried away by the desire to please, or by vanity, or by 
self-interest, to increase this original fault? They were 
factitious; they become false. Tliey are nothing but per- 
fidy and calculation; but they began by being almost spcm- 
taneous in their insincerity. This passage from artifice to 
falsehood is my husband^s whole moral history. And all my 
history — mine with my daughter — is, since I first observed 
in her, as a diild, touches of character so like her father's^ 
a terror lest the resemblance become complete. For any 
other mothe*- *^«ji I this facility of Jeanne's in transf<»m- 



PAUL BOURGET 343 

ing herself at the will of the persons she desires to please, 
thb Imowing what words to use, what manner to assume, 
ipriifle yet she feds nothing at all of what she expresses, this 
gift of attitudes, which contrasts so much, when one knows 
her wdl, with her interior indifference; for any other per- 
son 4han myself these would be only a young girl's queer 
ways, sure to pass off as she grew older. 

I have too carefully watched these tendencies not to be 
aware that they do but gro^ with her; and her father's 
destiny is too constantly present to my mind for me to 
accept carelessly what I believe, what I know, to be an ac- 
tual malformation of soul. I have so striven against this, 
since first I perceived it in her, and always in vain! I have 
so endeavoured to break up this spontaneous lying, to hinder 
the child's playing to herself the part of emotions that she 
does not feel! I have so laboured to render her simple and 
sincere; and I have so felt that there was, in the inmost 
structure of her being, an innate element, a something prim- 
itive and indestructible, that she is bom an actress as you 
and I are bom sincere, perhaps because, — I, her mother, 
shudder to write it, — perhaps because she has no heart, and 
never will have one. 

I have gone on talking to you thus, at such length, as if 
I had not confessed these miseries to you many a time 
before. Pardon me, and see in this a sign that I am greatly 
agitated at this moment and the depths of my memory are 
stirred. And, then, to repeat to you all these things is to 
plead for myself, in advance, in the affair I am about to 
relate to you, and of which this journey into Italy is the 
episode. I have said "the affair," but the word will seem 
to you too serious when you discover to what it is applied. 
Nor will you any better understand, at first, why I did not 
tell you of my solicitude when it first began, and why I do 
tell you of it now. The truth is, I hesitated long before 
yielchng to it myself; and, then, I had seen you but little 
this ^iinter since you were in mouming, and I am laying 
mine aside while Jeanne is entering society this year. You 
will remember that I always dreaded this period in her life? 
With the character that I believe I see in her, everythhig 



344 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

for her, more than for any other girl, depends upon her 
marriage; and a marriage depends so often on this first 
year in society — the impression a young girl produces, and 
the yoimg men whom she mieets. 

Will you be surprised when I tell you that she has had 
much success and also has shown much tact and manner? — 
too much for my taste. She, toward whom her father was 
so harsh, and who mourned so little for him, — ^you remem- 
ber how I suffered from that, in spite of everything? — she 
has carried into all her gayeties that reserved ahr of a 
daughter who, left alone with a widowed mother, lives upon 
a footing of concealed sadness. You know how I feared 
she might imitate her cousins, who are good girls, but with 
that detestable tone of the flighty young woman of the 
present day. On the contrary, Jeanne has made it her 
affair not to be like them. She, who since she began to 
think at all, has never taken an interest in anything but 
the bits of Parisian life that by chance came within her 
reach; she has foimd out, throu^*^ this genius for simulation 
that is in her, that the secret of success is to appear as 
serious, as old-fashioned, as the others are lively and "new- 
century," to use their o\vn expression. You will say that 
I am hard to please, and that causes are of no consequence, 
provided the result is good. Granted that a young girl has 
this dignity from vanity — the principal thing is, that she 
have it. 

And, indeed, I should have reasoned thus myself if this 
little scheme of Jeanne's had not resulted in ain^ening the 
most passionate interest in the young man whom I would 
least wish to see her marry, from a reason which is precisdy 
the subject of my scruples, and of which you alone, my dear 
friend and devoted confidant, will understand the origin and 
the nature. 

This yoimg man, whom you do not know, but whose name 
you have certainly heard, on accoimt of his father, is M. 
Lucien Salvan. He is the son of Dr. Salvan, the specialist 
in nervous diseases. This means, as you see, of course, that 
he will one day be rich, and also that his family belong to 
that position in life in which ?^ I's my ardent wish that J< 



PAUL BOURGET 345 

should remain. I have too fully experienced, in her father's 
case, how wise is the old custom of marrying in one's own 
station, with absolute equality as to fortune and birth. If 
Monsieur Izelin had not been the son of a woman of noble 
family, who had felt herself deprived of her social position 
by her marriage with a plebeian, he might not have had that 
lack of balance which was increased by his maniage with 
me — he, the hzilf-artist, very close to the aristocracy, I, the 
daughter of a man in trade, very close to the people. As 
regards social conditions, therefore. Monsieur Salvan would 
correspond perfectly to all that I desire. With this, without 
being noticeably handsome, he is a man of very good pres- 
ence. He has a pleasant face and agreeable manners. He 
has the reputation of being a worker, and has just passed 
his legal examinations brilliantly. His father and his mother 
— he resembles the latter especially, whom you would like — 
leave him free as to his career, and there can be no doubt 
that he will succeed in whatever one he may choose. This 
is the portrait of an ideal son-in-law, is it not? And because 
it is so, I ask myself if, in ardently desiring that this mar- 
riage shall not take place, I have not been seriously un- 
faithful toward my daughter. Do not think I have lost 
my reason; have patience to read to the end. 

I had not much difficulty, as you will easily suppose, in 
discovering that this young man was interested in Jeanne. 
The lover's tricks are always the same. No sooner had this 
one been presented to us than he began, as being the correct 
thing, to be 2ls devoted to me as he was to her. This is 
classic. It is equally so that I strove to profit by his as- 
siduities to study his character. The trait which struck me 
at once, no doubt because I recognised in it a close and 
singular resemblance to myself, was this difficulty of ex- 
pression, this kind of sh)mess which feeling only increased, 
this reserve under the eye of others, this sensitiveness, all the 
more intimidated the more it is intense, manifesting itself 
so much the less the more it touched. 

I have said to you that Lucien Salvan resembles his 
mother. He has her refined and distinguished manner, with 
a firmness of will that reminds one of his father. But the 



348 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

interest which had so much terrified me had yieMed to ab» 
sence. Eh bienf he has followed us. He is in Naples. This 
morning I have just received his card. This afternoon, this 
evening, to-morrow, he will see Jeanne again. Jeanne will 
see him. Dear friend, I implore you, write to me; tell me 
which way it seems to you that my duty lies, as woman and 
toother. 

If you think that I have been the victim of an unreason- 
able scruple, in considering myself obliged to do all that is 
possible to prevent this marriage, whidi I believe must be 
disastrous for a man who, after all, is to me a stranger, your 
conscience will tranquillize mine. I am extremely disturbed 
by the certainty which I now feel that this young man loves 
my daughter. 

How I wish you were with me; how much you are needed 
by your friend, who embraces you most tenderly! 

Mathilde Izelin. 

n 

While Madame Izelin, having closed her letter and 
sent it off, was asking herself whether or not she should 
mention to her dau^ter the visit of the young man 
whose presence in Naples she regretted for the complex 
reasons which have been summed up in these pages, -he 
himself was no less disturbed, but from causes of an order 
much more simple. .The mother had made no mistake; 
Luden Salvan was in love with Jeanne. The few weeks, 
which had followed the departure of the young girl, had 
been all the more insupportable to him, because he had not 
for a moment deceived himself as to the secret intention of 
this sudden journey. Madame Izelin desired in this way to 
interrupt a courtship so discreet that she had perhaps alone 
been aware of it. But that she had been aware of it the 
young man was certain. He could explain on no other sup- 
position the change which he had noticed in her manner 
toward himself. After having shown a cordiality of welcome 
which had seemed to his hopes almost a permission to ap- 
proach her daughter, he had suddenly become aware tut 
coldness hpd taken *>^ pi«cf if friendliness. 



PAUL BOURGBT 349 

He had said to himself, '1 have made some mistAke, but 
]n what?" The most scrupulous sdf-examinatton foniiahed 
liim no reply. At twen^-five years of age, and thoudi 
brought up in Paris, Luden had retained — ^Madame IseUn 
was correct in her opmion — ^that feminine sensitiveness nAidi 
reacts in suffering, from the least rou^ touch, instead of 
reacting in resistance. Beulgs thus made have need, for 
their hearts to open freely, of a complicity of good will 
arotmd them. Hostility ms^es than Aui themselves in; Jbrot, 
at the same time, stimulates and devdops still 'more that 
energy of the soul's dream which is thdr constant tempta- 
tion and their danger. No longer daring to manifest to 
Jeanne so openly the interest that he fdt, Luden gave hins- 
fedf up more to the lovely and diimerical idea that he formed 
of her for himself. Now that she was gone, and he could 
no longer ask himself each day when and how he could see 
her, his imaginative passion grew more and more intense. 
By force of turning over and over in his mind all posdbte 
data of the problem, he had arrived at this twofold conWc- 
tion: first, that some one had cut the g^round from under 
his feet with Madame Izelin — but who was it? — and, second, 
that the mother had planned some other marriage for her 
daughter. A name which he chanced to hear mentioned in 
the course of a conversation, that of a Monsieur de Barrois, 
the only young man of rank who frequented the sodety in 
which he had met Madame and MadonoiseOe Izdm, had 
confirmed this suspidon in his mind. Four short sentences, 
thrown out at random, had sufficed to establidi this mentel 
certainty: "We don't see Monsieur de Barrois now." — *^t 
shall see him again after Mademoiselle Izelin returns." — 
"C»il is that what you tiimk?"— "I tiiink he is very fond 
of her, and that Mathilde would be quite willing to have 
her daughter a marquise. Imagine it, my dear!" These 
few words; the recollection, on the one hand, suddenly re- 
awakened, of a ball where Jeanne had danced several times 
with Monsieur de Barrois, and the recollection, on the other 
hand, of a certain look she had in speaking to himsdf ; the 
feding, in spite of all, of that first friendliness be had been 
ccmsdous of in Madame Izdin— is there nttd of anything 



350 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

more to explain why, being at liberty to take a journey, and 
having first spent a week on the Riviera, another project, 
alike simple and romantic, had ^rung up in his mind? He 
knew, from other conversations, that Jeanne and her mother 
had gone away with the intention of visiting Naples and 
Sicily, and coming up to Rome for Holy W^. He con- 
sidered it probable that they would begin their journey at 
'the most southern point, and accordingly, three days before 
his visit to the hotel, he had arrived in Naples. 

What should he now do? He did not know, nor even 
whether he should find those whom he sought; and when he 
had discovered after some hours of seardi that they were 
in a hotel on the Chiaja, very near his own, the rashness of 
his enterprise suddenly became apparent to him. For two 
days he had kept watch upon the movements of Madame 
Izelin and her daughter, concealed, like an evil-doer, in a 
comer from which he could see the door of this hotel, asking 
himself whether he should go openly and inquire for Madame 
Izelin or should present himself before them, as if by acci- 
dent, in the street. Who has not known — ^who does not 
wish them b^ck — those foolish uncertainties of love in its 
young days, when the reason tries to give a good account 
of that which is only the blind and tender instinct of the 
heart, starving for presence and sick with absence! 

What Lucien SaJvan wished most of all was to show 
Madame Izelin the reality of his feeling. He wanted to 
say to her, "Do not sacrifice me without giving me a hear- 
ing." How would he set about formulatmg this appeal? 
"He did not know, any more than he knew whether that 
look of Jeanne^s, which seemed to him the index of an emo- 
tion like his own, was anything else than childish pride at 
having pleased him so much. He had never dared to de- 
clare himself, and in the resolution of making this ^ mad 
journey there lay, deeper still, the need to put matters to 
the test. If he found the yoimg girl saddened by their 
separation, it would be that she loved him. He had not 
been able to judge of her mood in seeing her pass, ^idi 
had happened *o him twice in those two days — with yiAai 
emo^^'^n, TTf ^aH <:aat hf >lpg?ipt figure, the lithe tU^ 



PAUL BOURGET 351 

the complexion like a flower, the blonde hair. But he ooidd 
not discern the expression of the features or of the eyes. 
Nor had he been able to judge the mother's face dosdy, ooly 
it appeared to him she was a little paler. 

Finally he had become ashamed of his hesitations^ and 
also a little afraid lest these ladies mig^t leave the dty with- 
but his having even spoken to diem; and he had presented 
himself at their hotel that morning at deven o'dod^ "with 
the idea that they would probably not be at home; but he 
would leave his card for them, and they would thus know 
of his presence. He h^pened upon a condorge, luckily, 
who was disposed to tidk, and in reply to the question* 
"When should I be most likdy to find Madame I^hi at 
home?" readily replied: — 

"After breakfast, usually; but not to^y. These lacfies 
are going to Pompeii at two o'dock." 

Upon this the lover had left the hotd, and, as soon as he 
reached the sidewalk, had hailed a aih and had himsdf 
driven full speed to the railway station. A train would leave 
for Torre Annunziata a little before twelve. He had taken 
it; and while Madame Izelin, now seated at the breakfast 
table, continued to ask herself whether or not she idiould 
speak to her daughter of Luden's visit, and how she hersdf 
should receive the young man, he had arrived at Pompeii. 
This had been done so impulsivdy, the conception and exe- 
cution of the plan had been so dosdy mingled, that as he 
crossed the threshold of the dead dty where he proposed 
to await Madame Izelin and her daughter, Salvan had a 
feeling that all this must be a dream. In less than twice 
thirty-five minutes, if he had been correctly informed, the 
two ladies would arrive by the same raQway. 

"They will know that I am in Naples. There will be 
nothing surprising in thdr meeting me here. I shall not 
seem to be looking for them. It will be equally natural that 
I should join them in thdr visit and that I should take the 
same train to return. And what a place in which to see 
Jeanne I" 

While the lover thus reflected, he had walked in as far 
as the archway of the Porta Marina, and he had now before 



352 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

his eyes that apparition unique in the whole world, (hat 
phantom-like apparition of the city smitten in the midst of 
its holiday, that Pompeii buried under ashes eig^iteen hun- 
dred years ago. He began to go along throu^ the streets 
where the small gray houses, roofless and doorless, rear their 
walls, still covered in places with coloured stucco, and reveal 
the secret of the activities or the leisures of former times. 
There are shops, the coimters hollowed into holes, with the 
jars all ready for the oil or wine; there are inner court-yards 
with colonnades; a fountain basin in which the jet of water 
no longer tinkles; walls whose frescos are half effaced. Else- 
where the hearth of a kitchen chimney still keeps its tripods 
and caldrons. Farther on, an empty well shows its curb worn 
by the hands that leaned upon it. There is a certain wall 
along which is tangled a leaden network of water-pipes, sup- 
ported, as they are with us, by rings of metal soldered at 
regular intervals. The chariot wheels have worn deep ruts 
in the paving-stones of the street, and the high sidewalks 
seem still to await the foot-passenger who took refuge there 
to avoid the vehicles. Peristyles of temples remain in courts 
surrounded by porticos. Statues once adorned these courts; 
their great brick pedestals are yet standing; and everywhere, 
at the end of these streets, are the noble outlmes of motm- 
tains — the Apennines, the hills of Castellamare; and m the 
bay the sea sparkles with its islands. The marvellous sa- 
gacity that the ancients employed in selecting the sites of 
their cities is revealed, and that need they had of the caress 
of extensive views. The pagan animal lived so much in the 
open air I So many pleasures were enjoyed in the open 
forum, the open theatre, the open amphitheatre! The laiid- 
scape had its share m all that he did; and at Pompeii the 
grace of this landscape became formidable when he who 
walked in the street, looking over his shoulder, percdved 
behind him the assassin of this merry city — the ominous vol- 
cano. This dangerous, beautiful Vesuvius dominates this 
enormous heap of ruins with its broad-based, graceful tri- 
angle of dark, velvety slopes; and on its summit the plume 
of smoke sways in the wind, white, yet now and then red- 
dened by the reflection of ^he subterranean flame. The im- 



PAUL BOURGET 35 J 

pression of the terrible destructive agencies of nature, thus 
lying close by the tokens of that human life so like our own, 
would fill the whole being with inexpressible alarm, were it 
not that the vast silence of the necropolis wraps us in a kind 
of peacefulness that is almost luxurious. It is the shudder 
in presence of the gloomy abyss of the tomb; and it is the 
charm of its long sleep. It is the stage-setting of a tragedy; 
and it is, with the profound azure of this sky and the ra- 
diance of this sunshine, a vision of beauty so tranquillizing! 
It seems as if the advice of the poets who were contem- 
poraries of these vacant houses, these ruined temples, these 
obliterated paintings, were still whispered in the surrounding 
atmosphere — that advice to be happy while remembering 
always that this happiness will pass away, to mingle with 
the most intoxicating savours of life the bitter taste of death. 
It is the silver skeleton that Trimalchio's slave brings into 
the trklinmm of a villa, doubtless exactly resembling this 
one of the Faunus or of the Vettii, while the rose-crowned 
guests repeat the Epicurean song: "We shall all be like this 
when Orcus has grasped us. Let us live, then, while it is 
permitted us to love!" 

The special turn of his mind would have, at any time, 
disposed Lucien Salvan to receive very keen sensations from 
this strange Pompeian decor. To this, occasion added that 
indescribable, penetrating emotion which seizes us when the 
drama of our o^mi personal destiny touches at some point a 
grand historic drama, and our individual happiness or un- 
happiness becomes a minute episode in an immense epic 
It had been decreed that the tremendous eruption which 
terrified the ancient world should occur, that the ashes and 
scoria? should be heaped up sixteen feet deep upon this gay 
city, that tlie lungs of Naples and then the kings of Italy 
should have worked a century and a half at clearing up this 
colossal cemetery, in order that these remains of the ancient 
Greek colony might serve as a romantic scene for the meet- 
ing of the young man and the girl whom it was his dream 
to make his wife. 

The inter\'iew promised to be decisive; of this Luden 
was well aware. Either Madame Izdin would have told 



3S4 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

her daughter that he was in Naples, and the young ^I's 
way of receiving this news would be to him a sure sign of 
her feelings toward him; or Jeanne remained unaware of 
his presence, and if he could study her face before she saw 
him he would know what e£fect this separation of several 
weeks had had upon her. If he found her evidently sad, 
grown pale, with the traces of suffering like those which he 
could read in his own face in the glass, then — ^then, it would 
be that she loved him! 

As the moments passed, the most contradictory b5^the- 
ses in regard to this very near arrival of thp two ladies 
were sketched out in Lucien's imagination. He finally se- 
lected, just upon the hour for the train's arrival, a post of 
observation where he would be sure to see them, and with 
every chance in favour of not being seen by them. He took 
shelter, armed with his lorgnette, at the comer of the wall 
which separates the temple of Apollo from the via Marina, 
a very short distance from the sole entrance to the ruins. A 
few steps distant, on the opposite side of the street, was the 
enclosure of the Basilica, which it was almost certain would 
be the first place visited; thence they would come to this 
temple of Apollo, while he would have time to make his 
escape before they arrived, and would then await them in 
the Forum, which they would take next in order. And so 
he was there, seated on a step, looking no longer at the 
columns of the temple, with the beautiful acantibus leaves 
of their Corinthian capitals, nor at the blue sky in the ^aces 
between them, nor at a Hermes still standing on his marble 
pedestal, in the folds of whose mantle agile, green-headed 
lizards were darting about, nor at anything except that via 
Marina, where the wave of tourists brought by the tram was 
beginning to spread itself. What if, at the last moment, 
Madame Izelin had changed her plan for the afternoon? 
What if, having received his card, she had left the city? 

What if Suddenly Lucien's heart stood still. He had 

seen them. They came in, a little after the rest, conducted 
by one of the guardians. In the field of the little glass, which 
was not quite steady in his hand, Lucien had the mother's 
face and th** d^'^eh***''* v b'^^h AnimatpH a' ^^is instant by im- 



PAUL BOURGET • 35$ 

pressions which suddenly caused him pain hi that deq> and 
unrecognized spot m the soul where we take cognisance of 
the m&iitely small things of life. Madame Iz^% which 
at first seemed veiled by some sad thought, began to expres8| 
from her first steps into this amazing city, a shock of snr- 
prise, in which Luden recognized Ms own recent feeling. 
Her eyes rested upon thb scene, whose poetry was unex* 
pected by her, with that kmd of poignant interest whidi ha 
had himself experienced. Her features grew eager with that 
sympathetic attention that he would have been so glad to 
see in the face of Jeanne, that he might at once have with 
her a kind of secret communion. Instead, the delicate face 
of the young girl, at the moment sunply natural because she 
did not know herself observed, was lighted with the amused 
Bmile of a child whom this poetry emanating from things 
does not reach at all. Luden would have reproached him- 
self with it, as with a crime, to wish that her face mi^t 
bear some trace of sadness. And yet it was a blow to him 
to observe that, since leaving Paris, she had gained that air 
of health revealing the perfect devdopment of a young or- 
ganism which no painful emotion has disturbed. If she knew 
of his presence m Naples, evidently she was indifferent to 
it If she did not know it, thdr separation was also to her 
a matter of indifference. Her brilliant, vivadous eyes re- 
garded the ruins with a curiosity which had no other aim 
Sian to gratify the most innocent, but also the least roman- 
tic of whirns. Jeanne held in her hand a small camera, and 
her one interest, during these first few minutes, was to find 
a good position for a snap-shot. Suddenly she stopped, and 
Lucien could see that she was ^'taking" first the Marina and 
then the door of the Basilica. It seemed to him — but was it 
not an effect of the imagination? — that the mother who 
looked on, also, at this child's play in which her daughter 
was employed, had around her mouth a half-smQe of pity. 
Almost immediately the two disappeared behind the stone 
enclosure of the building, and Luden himself walked toward 
the Forum. 

''What is the change in her?" he was saying to himself. 
^'She seems like another person to me. Slie does not know 



3S6 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

that I am here, and her journey distracts her. That is alL 
It is perfectly natural, and I am an egoist." 

Thus he reasoned with himself, leaning against one of the 
enormous masses of masonry which served as bases, the 
whole length of the Forum, for colossal equestrian statues. 
An hour earlier, upon entering this place, over which domi- 
nates the grand temple consecrated to Jupiter, he had been, 
even amid the anxiety of his expectation, penetrated by that 
imposing something, the atmosphere of Roman grandeur 
which forever floats over the place where have been en- 
graved the letters of the sacred formula of the S.P.Q.R. 
No son of the Latin land has ever looked at them but that 
the blood of his ancestors thrilled within him. A veil was 
now drawn for him over these monuments, over this blue 
sky, over this history. He had now only one thought in his 
mind: "She is changed. What has happened?" 

During these weeks of absence, the image of Jeanne, which 
he had never seen in its reality even when present, had still 
further been modified in his heart, to the point of becoming 
absolutely different from the actual person. And then, in 
Paris, every time he had met the young girl she, seeing her- 
self observed by him, had so natura^y exercised for his 
benefit her talent for attitudes I She had, by instinct and 
with an infallibly siure coquetry, posed for him as a child 
all emotion, all sensibility! She had made, with such subtle 
divination the soul-gestiures which would fascinate him I 
Now, for the first time, he had surprised her unarmed, so to 
speak, just as she was by herself and unwatched; and for 
the first time, also, he had the intuition, faint as a presoiti- 
ment, that he did not know this creatiure, even while be- 
lieving himself so much in love with her. There were the 
same features, but there were no longer the same expressicms. 
There was the same face, but not the same look. Luden, 
however, had not time to analyse this vague, confused dis- 
appointment. Already the large, dark-blue straw hat 
trimmed with bluets and surmounted by a simple knot of 
crimson silk, which framed the delicate face of Jeanne, ap- 
peared at the end of the place, and her figure so sfaoidbr 
in the travelling-dress of navy-blue serge, and her red para- 



PAUL BOURGET 357 

sol, matching the colour on her hat. At her side, always, a 
little behind her, he recognized the mother's round hat with 
black and white trimming, her dress of steel-gray, her parasol 
also gray. In the difference of dress, even, the difference in 
character of the two was manifested: the one, always a little 
too brilliant and emphatic, the other, always a little too 
modest and reserved. But if, later, Lucien, as he remem- 
bered this arrival, was destined to make this observation, 
and to draw from it this conclusion, at the moment one single 
idea absorbed all others: if he wished to present himself to 
Madame Izelin, and accompany her and Jeanne in their walk 
through the ruins, he must dedde, and at once. One last at- 
tack of timidity, one last effort, and he was in their 
presence. 

The mother had been the first to see him. The little 
nervous shock which she experienced — as the young man 
saluted her and, with the most pathetic awkwardness, stam- 
mered a few words expressive of siuprise — foimd outward 
manifestation only in the slightly dulled tone of her voice 
in reply. As for Jeanne, a little colour came into her cheeks, 
and in her eyes there was that sudden brilliancy which an- 
nounces, in a coquette, the only joy that she can feel — that 
of having there, in her presence, an evident proof of her 
power. It was but for a moment, and then that changeful 
face was stamped with the feeling that a young girl ought 
to have to whom a young man offers a proof of passionate 
devotion — a feeling equally remote from a coolness discourag- 
ing to the worshipper and from an emotion which would be 
an avowal or an encouragement. Lucien, meanwhile, was 
beginning, after the first sentences of commonplace polite- 
ness, to explain his journey m embarrassed language which 
quickly convicted him of deceit: — 

*'I have not been quite well," he said; "the winter, in 
Paris, became so severe after you left. My doctor recom- 
mended a milder climate. And I had never been in Italy. 
I yielded to the temptation. And I came as far as Naples. 
It was yesterday, in looking over the list of strangers in the 
reading-room of my hotel, that I saw your name, madame. 
And I took the liberty of going to inquire for you this mom- 



3S8 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

ing. You are quite well, madame, and also Mademoisdie 
Jeanne?" 

"Quite well," replied the mother. The young man's timid- 
ity, the hesitating tone of his voice, the mute entreaty of 
his eyes, touched her. She saw in his face that he had really 
suffered; and for a moment pity got the better of her 
scruples. She added: "You must tell us all the news from 
Paris. If you have not finished your visit here, we will walk 
on together." 

"I have only just come,** Lucien said. To meet once more 
in Madame Izelln, whose coldness had so much disconcerted 
him, the cordiality of the very first da}^ of their acquaint- 
ance, was so great a surprise that it brought the colour to 
his face, and he began walking along wi^ the two ladies 
without any more recollection of his recent impression of 
disappointment than if Jeanne had presented herself to his 
first look just as she now was. By what magic power of 
second sight had this young actress perceived what was 
expected of her and what impersonation she must adopt to 
complete his fascination? Certain it is that her amused 
smile of the earlier moments had given place to pathetic 
surprise, and that her eyes wandered over the ruins with a 
discreet melancholy. She was no longer interested in "tak- 
ing" the snap-shots, which later should divert her young 
friends in Paris. She was in truth — with her refined blonde 
beauty, the pretty, graceful slendemess of her waist, of her 
throat, of her wrists and ankles — the lovely apparition that 
Lucien had dreamed of meeting: Youth, touched with a 
tender sadness in the midst of what represents one of the 
most poignant tragedies of history; Hope, amidst the relics 
of a destroyed civilization and itself gently saddened by the 
eternal menace of Fate, imprinted everywhere in this deso* 
lation. And she was careful not to ask, "what was going 
on in Paris," as her mother had suggested. Did there exist 
such a thing as society? Were there balls and all manner of 
gossip? The young girl seemed to have forgotten them com- 
pletdy. She moved on, contenting herself with the utter- 
ance of a fe^ words, no^ ^nd then, very vague, doubtless^ 



PAUL BOURGET 3S» 

and very easily said, but, from these girlish lips, extraor- 
dinarily significant to her lover. 

'^What strikes me/' she said, pointing to those abandoned 
shops, those vacant baths, those empty courtyards, "is, how . 
few new things there are in life I If a* rain of ashes were to 
bury one of our cities, there would be nothing very different 
found from all this. It is a great commentary on the cate- 
chism's ^vanity of vanities.' " 

"Do you not think," she said, later, as they sat down on 
one of the steps of the theatre; "that a tragedy played here, 
with only a few spectators, and all this vacant city outside, 
would have an extremely fine effect?" And she added: "The 
portions of these ruins, which are most impressive to me, are 
those which recall scenes of festivity. Very often, at the 
theatre, the idea comes over me that all of us, the audience 
and the actors alike, are under sentence of death, and I 
imagine the place empty, and everybody gone. It b this 
dream that is realized here, and we shudder at it." 

"I should like so much to know," she questioned in froot 
of the colonnade of the little temple of Isis, "whether there 
were Christians in Pompeii when this catastrophe occurred? 
If there were, they must have been the only ones who had 
a hope." 

And in the Street of the Tombs, before the bas-relief of 
Naevoleia Tyche, which represents a vessel coming into port: 
"I was just saying, you know, that there was nothing newl 
What other comparison could we invent now to express the 
peace of heaven after the storms of earth?" 

These words occurred to her so ingenuously, she appeared 
so fully to comprehend and to feel all the poetry of the dead 
city, that Lucien listened with an admiration which kept 
him from observing the absolutely conventional character 
of all these remarks: that they were so general, so common- 
place, so stupid, in fact, ought to have shown him that this 
facile melancholy of the tourist expressed no direct personal 
feeling. But this mimicry of sentiment was accompanied 
with such a skilful play of lips and eyelids, Jeanne had such 
a clever trick of placing her reflections between two silences, 
as if she were thinking aloud! And the lover, on his part. 



36o THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

yielded to a hypnotism of credulity which would have risen 
to the height of rapture had he not again observed how the 
mother's face grew sombre. Madame Izelm, m fact, from 
the first words of this kind that her daughter had begun to 
speak, herself became silent. She now saw Lucien hanging 
upon this voice which she knew to be so false, and Jeanne 
improvising and carrying on a comedy the character of 
which the mother so well understood; and the suffering which 
she had come to Italy to escape, seized upon her anew with 
more force than ever. This had come to a point where 
to continue the walk was more than she could bear. It was 
halfway in this Street of Tombs, and in front of the bas- 
relief of the vessel on whose symbolic meaning Jeanne had 
just now commented, her eyes full of poetry. The evidence 
of pose in this child who was her daughter became too 
intolerable to her clearsightedness, and too intolerable the 
evidence of being its dupe, in this young man who himself 
really had, she felt, all the emotions which the other feigned 
to have. She said to them: — 

"I am tired. I will sit here while you go on to the end 
of the street." 

"But let us sit here with you, manmia," the ^rl said, 
with a solicitude that Madame Izelin repulsed almost harshly. 

"No," she replied. *1 prefer to be alone." 

"Can you tell me if Madame Izelin is displeased in any 
way?" Lucien ventured to ask his companion as soon as 
they had gone a few steps. "It almost seems as if she were 
not willing to see me here; and still, she was so kind to me 
at first!' 

"It is not you she is displeased with," said the young 
girl, "it is I." 

"You?" he asked. "But why?" 

"Because I have ventxwed to talk a little," Jeanne an-^ 
swered, shaking her dainty head, "and you have seemed 
interested in what I was sa3dng. Do not suppose, however^ 
that she is severe toward me. No. But she has her ideas* 
How can I explain this to you? My poor father was so 
good to her. He accustomed her to take the first place 
always, don't you understand? It is nnly natural that she 



PAUL BOURGET 361 

should not like giving it up, and to have any one seem to 
prefer me causes her pain. In short, will you pay a little 
more attention to her? And I beg of you, let us talk of 
something else." 

This was said so well, in a tone half sad, half childish^ 
that Lucien, the fastidious, did not even notice that in thus 
calling his attention to what she pretended was the mother's 
jealousy toward herself, the girl whom he hoped to make 
his wife Was committing one of those petty moral parriddes 
which he would have inexorably condemned in any other 
person. On the contrary, his feeling was one of S5mipathiz- 
ing respect for the reserve of this child who left her com- 
plaint unfinished. 

Could it be that this was truly the solution of the enigma 
which had barred his way so many times within these last 
few weeks, and that the admiration Jeanne inspired had ex- 
cited in Madame Izelin that base and hateful envy of a 
young woman's charm and beauty, always sad to see in 
a woman beginning to grow old, but almost monstrous be- 
tween a mother and her daughter? In a heart so imagina- 
tive and passionate as that of Jeanne's lover, an idea like 
this must cause revolution. 

It did, indeed, produce such an effect that, for the rest 
of the afternoon at Pompeii and during the return to^Naples, 
It was now Madame Izelin's turn to be amazed at the change 
in him. Without a word being said on the subject and quite 
as a matter of course, the young man had left Pompeii with 
the two ladies and, no less naturally, entered the same rail- 
way carriage with them. Notwithstanding Jeanne's sug- 
gestion, he could not take upon himself the task of con- 
versing with this mother in whose nature had suddenly been 
revealed to him such unworthy, such guilty, ways of feeling. 
Jeanne, on her part, — a little ashamed after all, in her con- 
science, at the calumny her insatiable need of playing a part 
had suggested to her without her fully measuring its scope, — 
was silent. The mother looked at the two with an intuition 
that, during the few minutes when she had so imprudently 
left them together, words of extreme importance had been 
^ken. But what were they? The train went on, follow* 



362 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

ing this coast of black lava, bathed with a blue sea. The 
sublimity of the view, which ended with the luminous point 
of Sorrento, the sharp rock of Capri, the softly outlined 
mountains of Ischia and of Posilippo, did not appease this 
feminine sensitiveness which perhaps was not fully conscious 
of itself. At the moment when the train entered the station 
at Naples, the fever of her anxiety had so gained upon Ma- 
dame Izelin that she could not endure the idea of under- 
going longer the uncertainty into which she was again 
plunged. The necessity of a definite explanation with Lucien 
imposed itself upon her. Jeanne had stepped out first, and 
the young man stood back to give Madame Izelm room to 
pass. Then the mother, with an abrupt, imperative voice, in 
which he could detect the extreme disturbance from which 
she was suffering, said to him: — 

"I wish to see you. Come to my hotel in the morning at 
half-past ten. But by no means let her" — ^and she indicated 
Jeanne by a glance — '^know of it I rdy upon your honour 
for this.'^ 

in 

The mental distress into which this int^view, so strangely 
and abruptly appointed, had plunged Luden Salvan had 
not abated when, at the designated hour, he was 
ushered into the salon of Madame Izelm's little apart- 
ment at the hotel. Why had she made him come? What 
decision, fatal to his happiness, was she about to an- 
nounce to him? 

Before the conversation of the preceding day, while 
Jeanne had not as yet revealed to him her mother's jealous 
sensitiveness, this interview would not have been at all 
alarming to the young man. He would have taken the op- 
portunity thus offered him to carry out the plan which had 
led him to make his irrational journey. He would have 
shown this woman, who certainly could not remain entirely 
indifferent to it, the sincerity of his feeling for her daugh- 
ter. He felt himself silenced, since she cherished this strange 
and wicked envy, of which her daughter seemed to stand 
so much in fear. And, agam, Lucien had said to bimsdf 



PAUL BOURGET 363 

that sach an aberration was not in human nature, that he 
must have misunderstood what Jeanne had said to him, or, 
possibly, that she herself had been mbtaken. His agitation 
was carried to its height by the manner in which this woman, 
to his mind so mysterious and i^x>n whom depended the 
happiness or misery of his life, now received him. 

She was seated near a window opening upon the vast pic- 
ture of Vesuvius and the bay. With her whitening hair, her 
pallid face, the gray tonality of her dress, she gave so little 
the idea of a person who suffers from the homage offered 
to another. Everything in her face revealed a supreme self- 
renunciation, a mortification of self, a soul whose desires 
are turned, solely and irrevocably, toward peace. Her eyes, 
especially, when they rested upon the young man, gave a 
convincing denial to the accusation that Jeanne had made. 
Their glance was so direct, so profound, so serious! There 
are expressions of eyes which cannot be reconciled with mean- 
ness of heart. It was evident that this interview was no 
less agitating to her than to the young man; her face re- 
vealed insomnia, and her hand slightly trembled. She made 
a sign to Luden to be seated, and began speaking to him. 
In the course of her reflection during the night, she had bit- 
terly reproached herself for having yielded hastily to the 
impulse of the moment. She had said to herself that she 
ought not to betray to a stranger the irremediable lack of 
sincerity of which she could not but be conscious in her 
daughter; that she might bring forward objections to a 
marriage between Lucien and Jeanne without alluding to 
the latter's character at all; and she had decided upon a 
plan which she now began to put in execution. She proposed 
to appeal to the young man's generosity, feeling quite sure 
that to touch this string would awaken an echo in his soul. 

"I desired to speak with you, Monsieur Salvan," she said, 
"because I have a very sincere esteem for you. There are 
decisions which a mother has the right to make without 
giving to any one her reasons for doing so. But I recognize 
in you a nature too noble, and too sensible also, to be will- 
ing to act toward you as I would toward another. I merely 
a^ you to answer me first this question: Suppose that one 



364 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

of your friends from Paris had met us yesterday at Pom- 
peii, yourself, my daughter, and me — what would he have 
thou^t?" 

"But, madame," the young man said confusedly, "if I had 
supposed that my presence displeased you, I would have left 
you — you and Mademoiselle Jeanne — ^at once. It was by 
your own authorization." 

"I was obliged to ask you to join us," the mother said, 
"and I do not regret doing so. It was my wish to see you 
with my daughter; I did see you with her. If I had had the 
least doubt on certain points, it would have been dispelled. 
Speak to me frankly, my child." At the moment when she 
was about to deal the blow, she could not resist giving him, 
in this affectionate appellation, a proof of her pity for the 
suffering she must inflict. "Yes," she insisted, "answer me. 
Do you believe that tliis friend from Paris, of whom I spoke, 
would have believed that we had met there by accident?" 

"No, madame," he said simply. 

"Be frank to the end," Madame Izelm continued, "and 
confess that your whole journey had but one thing in view: 
that you came to Naples because you desired to see Jeanne." 

"I confess it," Lucien replied. He felt, jivhile Madame 
Izelin spoke, that kind of dismayed confusion which over- 
comes young men like him, modest in their feelings to the 
extent of sh5mess, when one of their most inner secrets is 
put into words in their presence. They were aware that this 
secret was known to the person talking with them, and still, 
the clear statement of it discomposes them as much as if 
they had felt themselves secure of absolute mystery. It will 
happen, then, that instead of trying to conceal a part, at 
least, of what they had resolved to keep secret, they fed a 
need of complete frankness, and, in their turn, speak words 
of which they would have believed themselves forever in- 
capable. Jeanne's lover repeated, "I confess it;" and then 
went on, astonished, himself, at what he was daring to say: 
"I understand now that I did wrong, and that you mig^t 
very easily have misjudged me. It will appear to you irra- 
tional, but it is perfectly true, I never for a moment thoi^t 
of the possibility o^ being recognized by some person of cor 



PAUL BOURGET 365 

acquaintance — of my presence here being known, interpreted, 
conunented upon. Since you understand me so well, you 
have also become aware what my feeling is toward Made- 
moiselle Jeanne. But I know too well fiiat you have per- 
ceived it. I know that you left Paris on that account, be- 
cause you thought me too devoted to her. Then I was most 
unhappy. I said to myself that some one had ^x)ken ill of 
me to you. I believed this. I believed, also, that you had 
a plan for another marriage for Mademoiselle Jeanne. A 
name had been mentioned in my hearing. I could not bear 
this imcertainty, and so I left home. It was my intention 
to remain in the south of France, to endeavour to ascertain 
the date of your return, and to meet you somewhere in the 
north of Italy. Then I thought that I might come to meet 
you as far as Florence; then I thought I might come to 
Rome. At last the temptation was too strong; and I am 
here. I have told the whole story, madame. If you order 
me to leave Naples, I shall obey you. But I beg you to be- 
lieve me, there was no subterfuge on my part, and never for 
an instant did I dream that my journey coiJd compromise 
Mademoiselle Izelin." 

"She was not informed of your leaving home?" the mother 
asked. 

"Ah I madame I" he replied, so excessively shocked he 
could scarcely conceal it. 

"How he loves her!" thought Madame Izelin, at this new 
proof of the infinite delicacy of this heart of a young man; 
and she replied: "I believe you, Monsieur Sal van; and I 
am very grateful to you for having spoken with this entire 
sincerity. I will respond to it wi^ an equal sincerity. It 
is very true," she added, after a moment's hesitation, "that 
I took my daughter away from Paris because of you. But 
do not reproach yourself. You have overstenned in no way 
in your attentions the limits thi^t an honourable man should 
fix for himself T^>»ere a young c^irl is concerned. Nor has any 
person sooken ill of vou to me. I should not have allowed 
it, having too carefully observed you not to have formed 
a definite judG:ment in rerrard to you. I have already told 
you that I esteem you highly — ah, yes! infinitely." 



366 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

She said these last words with an emotion that she cotid 
hardly conceal; and this completed Lucien Salvan's mental 
confusion. This esteem in which she held him was too vio- 
lently in contrast with the resolution that she had had, that 
she still had, to separate him from her daughter; and he 
could not but protest against this contradiction, all the more 
painful to him, the more unintelligible it was. 

"But, then, madame," he exdaimed, "why have you 
treated me, why do you still treat me, like a person whom 
you do not esteem? I know that I have nothing which could 
very much gratify a mother's pride, that my family are of 
bourgeois station, and that I myself am destined to a career 
simply honourable. But is there here a reason that justifies 
this determined refusal which I feared in your departure 
from Paris, which I now read in your eyes, in your tone, in 
your whole attitude? You have made other engagements? 
I think it must be so," he continued, shaking his head, "and 
you will not tell me. You have the right — and still," he 
added, in an agonized voice, "if it is the young man whose 
name has been mentioned to me, I swear to you, madame, 
that Mademoiselle Jeanne would be happier with me I" 

This cry of ingenuous jealousy had no sooner escaped 
him than he felt its imprudence. But how recall the spoken 
word? 

"A f)erson has been mentioned to you?"' she asked. 
"Tell me what it is. Yes, tell me. I have a right to know 
what is said about my daughter." 

"Monsieur de Barrois," repeated the mother. "I thank 
you for letting me know. It is natural enough,** she con- 
tinued, with an irony which revealed the increasing fatigue 
of her nerves, "that this man of rank who comes among 
bourgeois like ourselves to obtain a dowry should circulate 
this report. I shall put a stop to it. It is not less natural," 
she added, "that jealousy should make you credit a bit of 
gossip so absurd. For, after all, what has Monsieur de 
Barrois in his favour? The man is a libertine and an idler. 
He has a title, it is true. Did you think," she insisted, ''that 
I was capable of deciding for this reason, for the sake of hav- 
ing a dauff^^^e*- ^ »"^»^uise? Yes," she affirmed, seeing, at 



PAUL BOURGBT 367 

this simple remark, the colour again come into the young 
man's face, "you did think it." And her voice grew sing- 
ularly bitter. "Ah I that would indeed be too great 
a deception to have certain feelings if we did not 
have them for one's self. Besides, we do not deceive 
ourselves. When I saw that you were ipterested in 
Jeanne, Monsieur Salvan," she resumed, "did I try to find 
base motives for your conduct? WTiy did you seek them for 
mine, when you saw that I took my daughter awry, and im- 
derstood that I was opposed to your marrying her? Why 
did you not give me credit? Why did you not think in 
this way: * Madame Izelin knows her daughter better than 
I do, she feels that our characters are not suited to each other, 
and she wishes to save us both from disappointments, that 
is air? Even you might have been able to divine," and 
it was her turn now to colour slightly, "that this resolution 
was painful, is painful, to me. I have not concealed from 
you how sympathetic you were to me; I do not conceal it 
now. You have in your nature every refinement, every 
loyalty, I am perfectly conscious, that a woman who has had 
the experience of life could desire in a son-dn-law. If I am 
opposed to this marriage, it is for no egoistic reason. Try, 
then, to understand this, and do not oblige me to say more." 
"I think I understand you, madame," Luden replied, after 
a silence. While the mother was speaking, and as it will 
happen in certain moments of decisive explanation, all the 
contradictory impressions through which he had passed since 
he had been occupied with Jeanne, at once reawakened in 
him. He remembered both the hopes that he formed Imn 
her cordial welcome, and his imcertainties at other thnes, 
his disappointment the preceding day, for instance, when he 
perceived her enter Pompeii, so evidently indifferent and 
JFrivolous: then, their sudden sjmipathy of feeling during the 
visit to the dead city, the mother's increasing disapproval 
at the intimacy of their conversation, and the explanation 
of it which Jeanne had given him. The enifi:ma of his sit- 
uation toward these two women became more and more ob- 
scure, unless the key to it was simply that the mother and 
daughter misunderstood one another. "Yes," he continued, 



368 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

"you are sure that Mademoiselle Jeanne does not love me. 
If this is so," and a tone of entreaty passed into his voice, 
"and if, as to me, you have that esteem for which I am 
deeply grateful, do you think it right to forbid me to try to 
malvc myself loved by her? There exists between Made- 
moiselle Izelin and myself, permit me to say to you, so much 
mental resemblance, we have so naturally the same way of 
feeling, that this sympathy might perhaps become on her 
part something closer. If you will allow me merely to live 
somewhat in her atmosphere, not now, not during this jour- 
ney, I am too well aware that social proprieties forbid it, 
but in Paris, in the society where we should naturally meet, 
that would be a test. Do I need to assure you that, if you 
permit m.e this, I will act with all prudence and discretion; 
and if, in six months, in a year, I have not been able to 
make myself loved by her then — yes, I shall feel it only too 
just that you should send me away. But from now till 
then " 

"From now till then," she interrupted with her serious 
voice, "I shall have allowed you to waste your life, to fill 
your noble, generous heart still more full of a sentiment 
which I am sure, understand me, absolutely sure, will never 
be shared." 

"Why not?" he asked. 

"Why not? Because that identity which you believe 
exists between your ways of feeling and hers exists only in 
your imagination; because you are a soul of one race and 
she is a soul of another; because it is still not too late for 
you to tear yourself away from that which will never be 
anything but a mirage. I have been like you," she insisted, 
with the tone of one who is calling up memories from the 
very depths of her heart and her past; "like you, I stood on 
the edge of life; like you, I was fascinated by what I be- 
lieved to be an accord of souls, a something true. And it 
was all false. Ah! if any one had spoken to me then as I 
now speak to you!" 

She stopped, terrified at having made an allusion so direct 
to her own marriage. Although the language of this half- 
confession was singularly obsciure to the yoimg man who 



PAUL BOURGET 369 

listened to it, there was too much sincere grief expressed 
there for him not to be touched by it, and at the same time 
he formed a too evident conclusion; Madame Izelin was 
opposing his marriage to her daughter because she had, in 
regard to this daughter's character and heart, a mistrust — 
of what nature? a suspicion — a suspicion of what? This 
evidence was suddenly so hard for the lover to endure 
that he replied: 

"But are you sure, madame, that you are not mistaken? 
It is very daring in me to touch on such a subject, but in 
saying to me v/hat you have just now said, you give me the 
proof of so much confidence! And, besides, I cannot leave 
you, now, without being entirely frank myself. I do not 
know what will be the result of this conversation for myself. 
I should be, not consoled but yet less unhappy, if it re- 
sulted in clearing up, in some degree, a situation which I 
can see must be most painful both both for you and for 
another person. You must pardon me," he added, hesi- 
tating as he spoke, "if I venture thus to interpret your 
words. It seems to me that they give the idea that the 
chances of unhappiness, if you consented to grant me your 
daughter's hand, would not come from my side. Pardon 
me if I go still farther. But, yesterday, in our walk in 
Pompeii, it seemed to me that she felt, also, on your part, 
a severity, — almost an ill-will, — and that she suffered from 
it. I have not lived very long, and still I know that between 
natures of great delicacy, and seemingly most fitted for 
mutual esteem, there may be a settled misunderstanding. 
I was only too conscious yesterday that Mademoiselle Izelin 
^she also, on her part — was disturbed at not being fully 
in harmony with you, and that she was made unhappy 
by it." 

"Ah!" the mother said. "She spoke of me to you? I 
might have known it. And at what time in the day? 
While you were finishing your walk in the Street of Tombs, 
and I waited for you? I su^)ected it." 

"Madame," exclaimed the young man, "do not, I implore 
you, take in this way what I have hem so unsuccessfully 



370 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

trying to say to you. I had seemed to divine in your face 
a certain displeasure " 

"And then," Madame Izelin interrupted, "you questioned 
her? You asked what was the matter? And what did 
she tell you? But I, too, divined it, what it was that she 
told you, merely by looking at you afterward, merely by 
seeing you now I She complained of me," the mother con- 
tinued, as if speaking to herself. "It would be so, of 
course; and you believed her — that would be so, too." 

She had risen, while sajdng these words, to which Salvan 
dared not reply. It is with certain conversations as with 
those walks over undermined groimd, where suddenly the 
foot awakens an echo so prolonged that one stops short. 
It was a like surprise at (he echo of his words that now 
seized Lucien. He became conscious of secret, unexplored 
depths, of all the interior ravage of prolonged meditations 
and solitary griefs, in this woman who now alarmed him 
by the inexplicable emotion with which he saw her over- 
come. She had ceased looking at him, and had gone, as if 
to tranquillize herself, to lean upon the window-sill. He 
saw the gray masses of her hair, her head resting upon her 
white, contracted hand, her other nervously grasping the 
edge of the window. What meant this sudden outburst of 
indignation against — ^what? Against a complaint whose 
nature she could not even suspect? What inconceivable, 
strained relations existed between this mother and this 
daughter, that they should appear to suffer from each other 
to tills degree? But Lucien had not been dreaming yes- 
terday; Jeanne had really said to him those words: "I 
have ventured to talk a little, and you have seemed to be 
interested in what I was saying. That is why she is dis- 
pleased." And — to make stUl dearer the meaning that was 
clear enough already, of what she had said — she had added 
the remark about her father, explaining, if not excusing, the 
widow's sensitiveness toward her daughter, yoimger, and in 
the full charm of her beauty. Nor had he been dreaming 
just now, in hearing Madame Izelin refer to her 6wn mar- 
riage, and utter that cry, wherein was expressed all the 
sachiess of her '^n'ned li^**. *hat "It was all false I" that "If 



PAUL BOURGET 371 

any one had spoken to me then as I now speak to you!" 
She, then, had been unhappy in her marriage? That Jeanne 
diould not know this was only natural. But it was not 
natural that the mother should hold enmity toward her 
daughter because of the miseries of her own married life. 
Nor was it natural that, at the faintest suggestion, she 
should suspect the girl of being unjust toward her. The 
yoimg man was afraid of what she might be going to say 
to him when she should emerge from this silence, more 
strange than her words. His heart beat hard, as at the 
approach of some catastrophe, when she suddenly turned, 
her face contracted, her eyes almost stem. 

"Jeanne is coming in," she said abruptly. "She is just 
getting out of the carriage at the door of the hotel. In 
two minutes she will be here. Place yourself there," and 
she indicated to Lucien the door which from the little salon 
led into her own room, "behind this portiere," and she 
pulled together the heavy material, after partly opening one 
leaf of the door. "You must do it," she continued; "you 
must know the truth. Then you can decide for yourself." 
She repeated, "You must do it," and there was such im- 
perative command in her look that the young man obeyed, 
without demur, a plan whose eccentric character only became 
clear to him when, hidden behind the heavy folds of damask, 
he began to hear the two voices, that of the mother and 
that of the daughter, exchanging very simple, unmeaning 
remarks, as it would have seemed to any other person than 
himself. 

But the words which Jeanne was saying, believing herself 
alone with her mother, so belied her words of the preceding 
day, her way of taking a certain allusion that Madame 
Izelin made contrasted so strongly with the kind of re- 
strained feeling that she had shown to Lucien in the visit 
to Pompeii — the entire conversation was so evident a proof 
of the artificialness of this nature, in which all was expres- 
sion and nothing was true with genuine truth, that the man 
who loved her could have cried out with anguish. This 
evidence was made more painful and more convincing by 
this peculiarity of it — that he heard the timbre of the young 






:::-r-ERy frexch stories 



zir'.s v:;:r -r^iv-.u: seei::? her face. For the first time^ 

ceir; r: ■.:r::.- ur.der ±e prestige of ha delidoos beanty, 
ill _- >.;:: v.i: T-.i5 s: self- willed and so facrluous was, as 
i: vere, r:i-r rcrcep::ble to him by ha tone of voice. She 
hjid a :cr.2in ::c zeztle and siiditiy emphatic way of utter- 
:rj .-.e: .-i .:rr.:ef. r'zlii had been extremely fascinating to 
hi-: ■ .:r" frrlfi zr.c gbcces accompanied this intonadon. 
He i-iii-ly frl: ±2: this beautiful voice spoke fclse, and 
i: r.-r: r.in :r.:e mere in that place far within, where one 
cerrei- :5 v.e inf.nitely small things of life, those nothings 
rs.2.1 esra^e arz!y5i5 and ahnost consdousaess. But what 
3 :"e '-hev p!iy in the history of one's heart! They are 
L.e :r/- r^velatirns that we have of the persanaiity in those 
^h.r:: Tre I.?ve cr whom we hate — that personality ^rtiich 
rr.iy -r^slVy be unlike what they do at any given time, but 
::ir. '.irily f?.:l to be like their voice, if only we know how 






.L. 



:r.e mother had said, "did you find what you 






■ Vr-. ir.ir'.r'.i." Jeanne had replied. "I decided on the 
d:-;-:.!:' v.i-Ji r.ir.e strands, with the little gold bars. I 
en €~:>2r.-e these in Paris for bars with pearls. Yon 
b'r: ;! I 5:e r.iT rs-.le the coral is. almost white, so beoxning 
t: - :! >.i g?cd cf ycu, mamma, to give me this! Yon 
c.:e -.* ■ vs ?-> r~-:d to nel" 

* V ■: ::•? r^r^v \r:ih me, then?'' the mother asked. 

"Pcrfj::/' h^ppy." the young girl replied **Why should 
I r. t ": V'w -:-? so indulgent to me, always." 

' rcrl.""s 1 sr.rill r.ct have a very long time to pet you," 
?.Tr. : .r-^ Ir:*:n resun.ed. "I am so worn out You know 
life hri- r:t :.\"?-y been et^sy for me." 

"I k-c.v it. rr;?.r:ma/' said Jeanne. "You have not been 

1' 1 T "^ ■ 5 ^^^ " """^ " »~ T « 
■ 2a L---^ a-* • m BJ^B 

Xc." tie r--ther re-!:ed. **But when I think of you 
and th?.t y?u v !;! sr^r^n b? r^.arried, I say to myself that you 
may pcriiips h.ave creat trinls in ycur life as a woman, and 
I wruld r';e Id b"* s"re that at least you have had none 
in yrur U:*e ?s a e'rl/' 
"What trials could I have had, mamma?" Jeanne asked 



PAUL BOURGET 373 

"One never knows," the mother answered. "If there 
were anything in my way of treating you that has given 
you pain, — even the least, — you must tell me." 

"\\Tiat an idea!" the young girl said coaxingly. She took 
her mother^s hand and kissed it. The soft sound of her lips 
in a long caress was just audible to Lucien, whose heart 
almost stopped beating as he heard this question put by the 
girl in a tone half playful, half emotional: "I think you 
must have some reason for speaking to me like this? I 
think I know what it is! There is some new plan in the 
air as to my marriage." 

"You are quite right," Madame Izelin replied. 

"And may one ask the candidate's name?" said the girl, 
still playfully. 

"It has come to my knowledge," replied Madame Izelin, 
"that jNIonsieur de Barrois has sounded some of our friends 
to know whether he could take a step in this direction on 
our return. I have not yet replied. You know I have told 
you, once for all, that when you are asked in marriage by 
any one, I shall tell you all the objections that I think are 
well founded; and then I shall leave you to decide freely. 
WTiat do you think of Monsieur de Barrois?" 

"I think," said the young girl, "that I have never dreamed 
of him r.s a husband, but that I find him very agreeable." 

"You have no positive objection, then?" the mother asked. 

"Not any at all," said Jeanne. 

"There is no ether person, then, whom you love?" in- 
sisted Aladame Izelin. 

"There is one person whom I love — it is you!" said the 
girl. And her companion of the preceding day, with a 
yet more painful amazement, heard her play her role of 
the petted and grateful child. That one, among all the 
attitudes of this truthless soul, was the one from which the 
mother ratural^v suffered most. She slipped away from it 
usually, but this time she allowed her daughter to show 
herself off, to r"^ke all the display she wished. "Yes," the 
girl repeated, "there is a person whom I love; it is you! 
And I shall love Monsieur de Barrois, if you think best. 
Marquise de Barrois — that sounds well, certainly; but firsi 



374 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

we must be sure that Monsieur le marquis would make a 
good son-in-law! Julie will be jealous, mamma; she can- 
not endure to have anybody seem to prefer me I" The same 
words that she had used the preceding day to define her 
mother's feelings toward herself recurred to her. On one 
point, the conviction that she was surroimded by universal 
envy, this girl, so instinctively artificial, was sincere. "But," 
she asked, "are you not going to tell me who wrote you 
about Monsieur de Barrois?" 

"That is my secret," the mother said; "only I wanted to 
question you before I replied." 

"Well," Jeanne said, "you know all. I am going to write 
to Julie," she added; "may I mention it to her?" 

"By no means," replied the mother. 

"I understand," said Jeanne. "Besides, I have enou^ 
to write about. I have already done Pompeii in my journal. 
I only have to copy the pages for her, making some little 
changes. I shall hear no more, I hope, about her tiresome 
Feria at Seville last year! Oh, say, mamma, if I am to 
be married soon, they could put diamonds on the bars of 
the coral necklace. That woiJd be so much better." 

This last remark was followed by a silence, and then the 
soimd of a door shutting, which made Luden know that 
Jeanne had left the salon; and almost immediately Madame 
Izelin came to raise the portiere behind which he had been 
concealed. The mother's eyes were even more troubled 
than usual. He could have discerned in them, if he had 
had the strength to reflect, a pity for himself and a regret 
for what she had just ventured to do; for, whatever were 
the faults, or even the vices, of her daughter's character, 
she was her daughter, and the other, the man whom she 
had resolved thus to cure of his illusion, was a stranger. 
But the lover, at this moment, saw, felt, but one thing — 
the girl whom he loved did not love him. All the earlier 
part of the conversation had been very painful to him, 
proving as it did that Jeanne had simply tricked him the 
day before in representing herself as a victim of her mother's 
envy. It had been very painful to him that their visit to 
Pompeii, which he had wished to keep forever sacred in his 



PAUL BOURGET 375 

thoughts for her sake, had been to her only an epistolary 
theme, to be used to astonish a cousin. But how easily 
he would have pardoned these failures of feeling if she had 
answered differently when her mother questioned her as to 
the Marquis de Barrois! It was this proof, unanswerable, 
definitive, of her indifference toward himself, that he could 
not endure! He said very softly to Madame Izelin: "You 
were right, madame. There is nothing more for me to do 
in Naples. I shall leave to-night." He bowed to her si- 
lently, and, before she could find a word to say, he was 
gone. 

She remained for some minutes motionless; then, abruptly, 
without stopping to put on her bonnet, she rushed to the 
door and down the stairs, hoping to overtake him before 
he left the house. She felt a need of speaking to him again, 
of explaining to him more fully her motives in what she had 
done. All her scruples of the past months, ending in this 
strange and cruel scene, vanished from her thought in 
presence of the distress that she had read upon the young 
man's face. She reached the hall, at the foot of the stairs, 
only as he was just going out of the hotel door. Twice 
she called him, but he did not hear; or, perhaps, he was un- 
willing to return. Then, when the portier came to ask if she 
would like to have the boy run after ce monsieur jranQais, 
and ask him to come back, Madame Izelin suddenly woke 
up to realities. She said, "No, it is not worth while;" and 
went upstairs to shut herself into her own room and weep. 
She had perhaps saved Lucien Salvan from a marri^r^e v/hich 
would have rendered him unhappy, but she had lost in him 
the person who, of all others, would have been dearest to 
her as a son. 

Thus she had been sitting, crying, in her own room, for 
fifteen minutes, when she heard her daughter call to her 
from the salon. Collecting all her strength she called back, 
louder than was necessary, that the loud tone of her voice 
might conceal its emotion, "I am coming directly," and 
bathed her eyes that the girl might not see the traces of 
tears. For years the tricks of word and manner that Jeanne 
employed to commiserate her nx)ther's sadness or indiqx)- 



376 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

sitions had been particularly painful to the latter. At the 
present moment such factitiousness was physically unen- 
durable. But this trial was spared her. Jeanne was too 
much occupied witli herself to observe her mother's face. 
She had brougiit in her letter, and was so pleased with it 
herself that she wished Madame Izelin to readmit, and held 
jt out to her, saying: 

"Here is my letter to Julie. See what you think of it." 

The mother took the sheet of paper covered with its large, 
stylish hand%vriting, in which a graphologist would have dis- 
covered an arid and capricious nature by the letters without 
down- or up-strokes, all equally heavy, and by the t's crossed 
at the top. It consisted of a series oif sentences upon Pom- 
peii, very adroitly borrowed from the conversation of the 
preceding day with Lucien. She recognised the yoimg man's 
own words, her words, a word from the guide-book even — 
the whole giving the idea of a nature so fine, so accessible 
to art! Salvan's name, of course, was not mentioned. 
Before this little masterpiece of artifice, the mother's melan- 
choly redoubled. She said to herself, "I did well;" and to 
her daughter she said: "Your letter is admirable. It is 
very prettily written." 

"I thought you would not dislike it," said the girl, who 
could not grasp the secret sarcasm of the mother's phrase; 
"I wrote it with feeling. That is the only kind of letter 
that I like. That is what I love so much in Italy. Every- 
thing appeals to one's heart here." 

"If he had read this letter, and if he had seen her like 
this," the mother thought, remembering the scene of the 
past hour, "he would believe her!" And again she said to 
herself, "I did well." 

Florence, May, 1901. 



A MARRIED COUPLE 

{Un Couple) 
By MARCEL PRfiVOST 

ALL the Parisians who frequented Nice and Monte Carlo 
last season remembered having seen at the Ciide, at 
the English promenade, at the theatre or at the races^ 

the curious couple, whom Paul B had christened "lovers 

from beyond the grave." Indeed they made one think of 
^irits from a supernatural land of love. She, still young and 
very beautiful, gave this impression because of her emadated 
form, the pallor of her face, and the aesthetic indifference of 
her splendid blue e3'es; he, because of something youthful, 
and hopelessly worn out that was betrayed in Us nervous 
and depressed walk, and the carriage of his head, at once en- 
feebled and proud. Although he was getting gray he would 
have been handsome if not for the large bla(£ band whidi 
covered his right eye, and the upper part of his ri^t cheek, 
not quite concealing the bums which seared the whole side 
of his face. Hand in hand these two beings would sit, and 
listen to the music, and breathe in the perfinnes, and gaze at 
the far horizon, in the delightful fdryland, never minting 
with the bustling noisy crowds which surrounded them. They 
were never seen with friends, and they did not seem to de* 
sire any, happy doubtless in the miniature universe wUdi 
each was for the other. At nightfall, they would disiq[q)ear; 
few people knew their retreat They lived to a handsome 
villa, on the short of the gulf, to Villi-francW-Mer, rli^tnear 
the unpretentious house where I was staytog. They mate 
known as M. and Mme. Le TUerrey. 

Translated by Amy Schechter. Copyright, 19x7, hy Bold ft* 
Liveright, Inc. 

377 



378 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

I came to know them merely by chandng to be thdr 
neighbour. The young woman, whose lungs were weak, used 
to leave the terrace where they dined early tete-a-tete. Many 
a time her husband and I would remain together gmnUng cig- 
arettes, and lost in one of those silent reveries, or cue of those 
leisurely conversations which the serene vastness of the views 
there inspires. And one evening it came about that he Idd 
me their story — without my soliciting his con5dence — on an 
evening; when tlie air, milder than usual, hea\y with the 
scent of African flowers, or the greater calm of the sea — like 
molten copper beneath the broad rays of the moon, awoke h 
us both the desire to speak low, and to tell or hear tales of 
love. 

"You have surely guessed," Le Thierrey said to me, "that 
there is a drama in Lucy's past and in mine; a conmionplace 
trngrdy, if one considers only the action itsdf, but rare and 
unusual perhaps because of its causes and its cmsequences. 

"I nm thirty-two years old; my wife is twenty-six; she was 
pcvcntrm when I met her. She bad cccse to live in Paris 
with her mother and her older sister. T!h?y I:\-ed on the fifth 
floor of the house and we were on the tost. The life of 
these three women was, as h^^)cns in ctdz^y pK^-incial bour- 
geois hou.scholds, abn^tly broken up by a ^pciVd chOd's 
caprice. Lucy developed an irreastible bent tx the stagey 
and since she did as she pleased with her mecb<r and her 
sister Cl^mence, being so pretty and bright, 3i> ^^Sstic and 
IK) wilful, she made them decide to live in P^tSv ^<ere, diqr 
tliought, she would burst forth as an artist acd a cdebrity 
by the mere effect of the artistic atmosphere of the dty. 

"At this time I left the ficole des Chartcs. My life till 
then had been divided between study and the affection of 
my family. I was a kind of precocious savant, tinud and 
with an untouched heart I fell in loN-e with Lucy at first 
alf^t. From that day, whatever other women could offer 
mo meant nothing to me; and actually even now, I am so 
indifferent to femmine beauty that I do not know it lAen 

I see it. 

"The girl realized the state of my feduigs, and pnmpfly 
began to make me suffer. In our furtive meetings on Oie 



MARCEL PR&VOST 379. 

stairs— meetings which I managed at fhe cost of gieat in- 
convenience, watching for her return from the Consovatoiy; 
in those meetings when I passed dose to her, my heart &ul* 
ing me, scarcely finding strength to greet her, she pretended 
to pass without seeing me, or rather, what was sdll more 
cruel, she contrived to be taken home by her dasamates^ with 
^dr smooth, sallow, bluish diedss; takfaig thdr arms with 
every appearance of tenderness fhe moment she saw me. 
Apart from this, she remained impregnable, stubbornly in- 
dilEferent to love, as unkind to others as to me. 

'Tuckily my passion had two advocates in Lu^'s mother 
and sister. These two, whose one idm in life was the g^iy 
end happiness of their idol, immediatdy dreamed of a mar* 
riage which would make her ridi, and ^ve her as a husband 
a man of good family who adored her. You can imagine 
what stru^es I had with my family, (m account of fUi 
marriage. As for the girl, she would never have consentedi 
had not repeated failxu-es, first in the Conservatory, and then 
in several small trial scenes in whidi she made her dflmt, 
disgusted her with the stage, and insfrfred her with the deaiie 
to wipe out all fliese humOiations by means of a brffliant 
marriage, which would humiliate her companions in their 
turn. 

'1 quarrdled with my family. I married Luqr. Her 
mother and elder sister lived with us. 

^Till then, I had only to suffer the usual agonies of those 
who pursue a woman, who is bdoved and cruel, over a thou* 
sand obstades. But it was after possessing her that I b^ 
came truly wretched. Lucy did not refuse hersdf to me; 
she managed something worse than that As she gave her* 
sdf to me, she dedared hau^tHy that my caresses wers 
odious to her, that she endured them because she fdt has 
sdf obliged to, having sold hersdf to me for my fortune 
and my name. When she 9p6kt like this, I was forced to 
admit to mysdf that she was not lying. 1^ the eyes of mf 
wife I stood for her lost career, her vanished artistic 8^017. 
I was the livmg permanent proof of the crumbling <rf ha^ 
dreams. 

"^The burden of deoqition wUdi die loaded qxm all idie 



380 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

surrounded her, bore most heavily on me, whom she could 
hurt most because I was the one who loved her most. OhI 
the baseness of desire! I endured all, her coldness, her 
disdain, her msults, so long as she gave me her beloved body, 
whose possession became more dear, the more degradation 
it cost me. I had convinced myself that my life was united 
to an exceptional soul, with a sort of pathological perver- 
sity, possessed by egoism and malice, and the desire to give 
pain; and this soul I still adored and still fondly hoped to 
win over into adoration of me. 

"I will not retrace with you the stages of my Calvary. 
All that pride and tenderness of a husband could suffer, I 
suffered. I am a man, sir, to whom his wife said one day, 
*I am going to betray you, not because I love another, but 
because I hate you and want to dishonour you.' And she 
did so. She betrayed me with an individual worthy of the 
utmost contempt. And I did not part from her; I went on 
adoring her." 

Le Thierrey stopped speaking. It was quite dark by now. 
In the profound silence we heard nothing but the slashing of 
the wavelets, and the hushed notes of a piano from the closed 
windows of the villa. For a moment my companion listened 
to the music. He murmured with an expression of ineffable 
tenderness: 

"The Pastoral Symphony! It is she who is playing!" 
After a few more moments of silence he went on: 
"My mother-in-law died the year following my marriage^ 
but my sister-in-law, Cl^mence, kept on living with us. She 
was my one consolation. No one could better understand 
and sympathize with my misery than this poor girl whose 
whole life had been a voluntaty sacrifice to the woman I 
had chosen for my companion. We did not need to con- 
fide in each other to know each other's sad secret The day 
Lucy broke the last barrier, and left me to go to live wiA 
a lover, only C16mence was able to keep me from 
myself. 

"I lived. . . . We remained, the elder sister and I, guar- 
dians of the ei^Dty h'^^r+h, like two old people i!dx>se mly 
child was de^r ii» - >rM At once declared that we 



MARCEL PR6V0ST 381 

lovers. It was false, it was mad— need I say so? Our 
aching souls were utterly dosed to love. But the world does 
not understand how a young man and a young woman can 
associate in order to weep toge&er. The talk of gosripings 
was brought to us; we were counseUed to put an end to our 
unequivocal situation. We paid no attention and oontfaiued 
living as before. Together, at least, we could talk of Lucy. 
And then, what did these idle remarks matter to us? Were 
we not two beings retired from the world? 

"Here comes the drama of which I i^ke to you. This 
drama, I told you, is commonplace in itself; so I will tdl 
it to you in a few words. Lucy heard that I was her sister^ 
lover. Why did this woman, who did not love me and who 
was betraying me, at once conceive a jealousy so sharp at 
to suggest a crime to her? I suppose that she was exasper- 
ated by the thought that the two beings whom she had tor- 
tured could afford each other the supreme consolation. It 
was the period when several sa[isati(nial trials had made 
vitriol fa^ionable. One evenmg as Qdmence and I were re- 
turning home arm m arm from a mdancholy walk, a woman 
hidden behind the comer of the ho^ suddenly tmmaskfd 
herself and hurled at us the contents of a vial full of vitrioL. 
Gemence was burned on the face and breast She died next 
day in horrible convulsions. I was only sprinkled on the 
ri^t temple, but I lost my eye and remained scarred for life. 

"Have you heard, monsieur, of those cases of madness or 
idiocy cured by a fall, by a violent shock to the head? 

"There took place in the soul of Lucy a mirade comparable 
to these in suddenness and completeness. This soul, like that 
of Lorenzaccio de Musset, was pregnant with a crim?, but 
one crime only. Once it was committed she suddenly be- 
came once more an ordinary human soul, pitiful and sufTer- 
ing. It was as sudden and final as an ezordsm. Seem? us 
fall she threw herself on our bodies, weeping and denoundng 
herself, calling for help in a terrible fit of de^r. In prboD 
she had to be constantly watched in order to prevent het 
from killing herself. And when, by accusing mysdf and tfie 
innocent memory of her aster (ndio, I am sure, pardoned 
her for it), I succeeded hi securing her acqdttd, it was she 



382 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

who tended me with incomparable devotion, and who saved 
my life at the risk of her health. 

"These events are several years old; but since then, the 
reconquered tenderness of my wife has never diminished. At 
the same moment that her heart opened to pity and to love, 
her body revived to caresses. What more shall I tell you, 
monsieur? I have deliberately forgotten the past; I love 
and am loved; these words contain ^1. I am disfigured and 
infirm for life; most of my family has broken away from 
me; those of my former friends who did not openly abandon 
me, pitied me or despised me; doctors tell me that my life 
will be short, and I sometimes feel in my wound a recurrence 
of terrible pain. But Lucy is mine; at last she belongs to 
me, body and heart; I regret nothing; I have not paid too 
dearly for my happiness." 

My companion ceased to speak. Noises had stopped, and 
the fires were out in the villa; the piano was silent. Only 
the mysterious voice of the sea broke the stillness. And 
without a word, lost in reflection, he continued to gaze upon 
that still, trembling ocean so often compared to the soul of 
woman. 



LOVE INTHULB 

(Un Amour de TkUU) 
By MAURICE BARR£S 

IN Seville, the dty of her birth, Vidante scandalised eveiy- 
body by her beauty and her indiscretions. For at twenty 
she had the romantic habit of becoming a sister to 
the handsomest, most spirited and noble youths of her dide. 
She believed, quite mistakenly, of course, that if one's senti- 
ments were lofty and one's conduct irrq>n)achable one cotdd 
afford to ignore all malidous gossipings. After being in- 
sulted several times she left Spain, first marrying a young 
Frenchman, who paid for the marriage with Us healA and 
his career. 

They travelled for three years, then settled down in F^tfis^ 
and at the end of iier twenty-fifth year she was left a widow. 

Her husband's family had not accepted her with very 
good grace, for despite their distinguished name they were 
people of a bourgeois cast of mind, who looked upon eveiv 
foreign woman as somewhat of an adventuress; and this 
young woman was not the sort of person to make them be- 
lieve the contrary. And so, when she was left alone, they 
did nothing to aid her in keejMng up her poation in sodety, 
where her hrgeness of soul, a thousand reports from Spa&i 
conceminc: her, and her rare charm soon placed her hi a 
compromising position. It h^^pened, moreover, that she 
accepted the devotion of a young man, as one is hai^y to 
do at that age. . 

No one knew anythmg very definite about thdr relations^ 

Translated by Amy Schechter. G>i>3rright, 1917, bf Boni ft 
Liveright, Inc. 

383 



384 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

but as usual, people took the opportunity of thinting the 
worst. They were right. The important thing is that the 
pair treated one another during this liaison, which lasted &r 
eight years, with infinite tact and delioajy. Nor did ih^ 
purposely hurt one another, but on the contrary they enno- 
bled one another by proving in their relations, that not 
everything is base and vulgar in this world. Thus they lived, 
he vith nothing to occupy him, devoted and grateful; she, 
haughty and capricious towards the indifferent, all tender- 
ness and devotion towards him. Marriage did not teoq)t 
them for a moment; it would have meant to introduce the 
element of obligation into the habits which they adopted 
without over much formality. 

They r\eX each other in society, at the theatre, and at the 
races, and almost every day they ^ent long hours together 
in their apartment in the Avenue Montaigne. The young 
woman slipped by insensible degreess from the best drdes 
into male society alone, and seemed to be content with it 
As for him, he never wearied of hearing her recount the ad- 
ventures which had befallen her in SevUle and in the course 
of her travels. 

She told him of the wild asses in Africa, of the magnifi- 
cent fruits in Andalusia, of the climate in the Balearic Isles: 
she found Italy a trifle insipid after her rugged Spain, ^e 
detested England, and cared nothing for Central Europe with 
the exception of the simimer evenings in the Carlsbad res- 
taurants, where the gypsies, known there as "Lothars," 
used to sing. He was in accord with her in respect to all 
these matters, and enjoyed immensely the picturesqueness 
and vividness of the sensations and impressions which she 
communicated to him with the manner of a blas6 child. 

She took special delight in a romantic conception of life, 
which she had long ago evolved and which she loved so much 
that she absolutely refused to allow herself to be disillusioned 
of this young girl's dream; it would have been a splendid sort 
of existence, she said, to form a perfect friendship, as be- 
tween brother and sister, with young men of very refined 
sensibilities and to live in an atmosphere of pleasure, beauty 
and mutual trust, like children overflowmg with life, who 



MAURICE BARRBS 385 

I 

kiss each other and share their toys. And he, amidst these 
daring fancies of hers, which had, after all, somewhat lowened 
his moral tone, experienced a peculiar pleasure, very subtle 
and very profound, in pitying this being made iq> of optim- 
ism, sweetness and sensuality. His mind, moreover, grew 
keener in following her, for she judged things without ie> 
gard to morality, but only accorcfing to the dictates of her 
^ense of beauty and her passion for refinement 

However, he did not see complete hiq[^mess in the face of 
this beloved friend. Did she perhaps desire more violent 
emotion, did she believe herself not perfectly loved? He 
would question her sometimes. 

''No," she would answer, "I am not suffoing, but it seems 
to me that there is no joy that I have not already expe- 
rienced." 

He clasped her in his arms without a word, for he fdt 
she was right. Splendid horses, the most humble of ad- 
mirers, everything that the most meticulous snobbism mi|^t 
exact— all these she had, and now there was nothing more 
for her to take pleasure in, not even at her dressmakers. 
In a word, she was sufifering from having exhausted all sen- 
sations. 

One idea to which she frequently kept reverting, was that 
of visiting the countries of the far East, and he understood 
very well that she had built up an image of them from 
Japanese vases, brocaded silks and certain amusing figures 
at the Chinese legation, a purely legendary conception utter- 
ly devoid of everyday reality. It was the one experience 
which this fanciful person had not made trial of. She 
believed in China, not having had the occasion to see that 
there too existed that element of imperfection yAnch detracts 
from everything that inheres m all reality. She often said: 

"When I grow old, my beloved, and fed myself uttoiy 
incapable of enjoying the things which I possess, I shall go 
down there, send you gifts, and die." 

As she had in her as much romantic feeling as a person 
can well possess without actually descending to the ridicu- 
lous, this pleased her — to end her life m}rsteriousIy, and to 
drown herself in the crowd, just as a little sidk animal drowns 



386 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

itself in the Seine. Ah! to die, on a blazing day, practically 
abandoned, in a hotel in Shanghai, and by her end compd 
the mercy of God I 

At last, the feeling of blankness frc»n which they suffered 
became so great that she judged that the moment had come 
when they ought to separate, and though he felt that neither 
could any longer contribute to the happiness of the other, 
nevertheless his suffering was great, for it brought home to 
him definitely that their happiness was at an end. She told 
him of her painful intention, and then avoided discussion of 
it. This was partly out of consideration, and partly in 
order that his pleadings might not weaken her resolution. 
By a tacit agreement, they made a pretense of treating her 
undertaking merely as a trip to the countries of the East. 
Only the last time that they saw each other, in the apart- 
ment where they had lived through so much, they were ter- 
ribly agitated. In the ante-room, dim in the closing day, 
near the door which for years had been for them a door to 
a universe apart, and which was now to be, they thought, 
only the entrance to a tomb, they united in a long embrace; 
not at all as a lover and his mistress, but of two beings of 
the same race who were met upon earth and who had never 
been hypocritical with each other. 

"Promise me," she said to him, "that you will come here 
again sometimes. Always preserve our home, and let every 
trifle remain as we are leaving it today. If any woman 
chances to please you, do not have the least scruple about 
bringing her here, provided that she be a true friend, for 
my one wish is that you should be happy. But one evening, 
Christmas eve, I ask you to remain alone in this apartment." 

She thought that on Christmas great mysteries took place 
in nature; that on that night, things acquired souls, and 
became alive. 

"Promise me," she repeated, "that you will come and 
think of our former joy amidst all the things that used to 
surround us." 

She spoke with so much tenderness, in a tone so purified 
of all the pangs of jealousy, that both of them felt the bitter 
pleasure o^ ^-hf ip^^^tpA aithotiyir tv»oT- ^m not know to what 



MA URICE BARRES 387 

or to whom they devoted themselves, and their eyes filled 
with tears. Ah! how wretched they felt at their impotence 
to give joy to one another, and perchance ashamed to find 
faaj^iness only in their grief! 

He did as she wished, and in that apartment, given over 
to silence, he came at irregular intervals to spend an hour 
calling up the images of the past? Although she had prom- 
ised to write to him, and to give him her successive addresses, 
he received no word from the traveller. For the rest, if he 
suffered, it was a delicious melancholy, a sort of "pleasure in 
self torture," in thinking that he had let his fair treasure, 
his beloved, be drawn into the whirlpool. 

Now, when eight months had passed, and Christmas was 
approaching, a chest filled with precious objects from China, 
was delivered one day in the Rue Montaigne. He put off 
opening it. Then on ^e night, when, in order to celebrate 
the birth of the Infant Jesus, the faithful embrace in the 
churches, and the viveurs in the cabarets, he shut himself 
up in their favourite room. 

The lamps, set in their wonted places, shed upon the same 
decorations those lights and shadows, amongst which he and 
Violante had passed so many evenings. Dressing-room and 
music-room, upon both of them was the spell of the sweet- 
ness of their intimacy and the memory of impassioned music. 
It was in this spacious room that he had been intoxicated 
with tenderness and beauty, and for him it was filled with 
a luminous and ardent atmosphere, like the voice of Van 
Dyck in the love-song of Siegmund. It was there, at the 
knees of his mistress, that little by little he had discovered 
beneath the mask of the woman of the world, the real woman, 
not at all a being made up of social graces and pretty ways, 
but instinct with humanity, and still very close to the little 
girl who used to play with dolls. That piano, those large 
mirrors, that dressing-room, those vast wardrobes so gay 
with ribboned lingerie, were not merely inanimate objects, 
but friends, well -beloved companions; those smelling-salts, 
which she played with while talking together, which she so 
often pressed to her appealing face, that blue vase in which 
she delighted to arrange the yellow tulips flecked with red 



388 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

and green, which went by the droll name of "parrot tulips^** 
all the dainty fripperies, with which she had amused herself^ 
all those toys for grown-ups — everything had taken on a 
certain spiritual quality, something which might almost have 
been called a soul, by the f^ct that it had known the caress 
of her touch, her glance, and her voice so tender with love. 
In her hands and beneath the breath of her young mouth, 
the flowers lived as though they actually were gentle living 
creatures; they were no more tiian vegetables now that the 
beloved one who animated them with her loving kindness 
was no longer there. 

Little by little the objects began to speak with him. . . . 
First the great three-panelled mirror before which she had 
instinctively fallen into graceful poses, shadowed forth her 
beauty. "It is here," he said to himself, "when I admired 
flie variety, the versatility, the thousand aspects of her charm, 
that beauty came to seem a livmg thing to me, the sum of 
a human being's usefulness. Violante gave me a distaste for 
museums and libraries, where things are motionless and 
barren. It is through her that I learnt the rather humid 
sensuality of beauty, and for me she replaced also the forests 
and the ocean and the splendour of night in the wilderness. 
For I possessed their fragrance, their infinity, and their 
melencholy, according as her hair was loosened in Httle-g^l 
fashion, and her eyes drowned in bliss beneath my lips. 

"Here are the dressing tables and the familiar objects which 
she would not let me touch, hastening to serve me herself, 
because it amused her, she said, but, I knew well, influenced 
by a deeper motive, by the voluptuous joy of self-humiliation 
— ^she, who was so charming, that she might love the bettar. 

"It was at this window through which the light streamed 
so brightly, that I sometimes turned my eyes away from 
her face, on days when her features looked drawn, and her 
expression fatigued, not at all because the circles around her 
eyes were disagreeable to me — something left to desire in her 
would have made me love her the more — but because I 
feared lest, conscious of her momentarily lessened beauty, my 
looking at her should make her suffer. 

"And herp ic Ha I'mmepcA irrnchi^ir^ where we passed the 



MA URICE BARRES 389 

first hours, always so forced, of our liaison. Outside, it was 
a sad snowy afternoon; in us were mingled feelings of desire 
and calculation. But one day, two months later, when the 
first fire had spent itself, she uttered the profound truth at 
last — the occasion was a tactless remark with which she had 
offended me — ^which touched the very core of existence more 
decisively than all the words of love, and even than the first 
tutoiment on dying lips. A terrible utterance, which makes 
a sol^nn affair of a caprice, and transforms those between 
whom it passes. How can I recreate the impassioned tone, 
the vibrant voice with which she said, slipping into my arms, 
*In love, my dearest, there is no self-respect.' " 

A saying of too strong a flavour, sensual as vice, and which, 
wrong from a creature of intoxicating finesse and grace, de- 
moralizes all one^s being more than twenty years of debauch- 
ery. Under that apparent nobility of sincere feeling, what 
a vessel in which to drown all the dignity of a man and all 
his pride! Love teaches disinterestedness, it is true; but 
it cuts us off from the best as well as from the worst. Sad 
and bitter summing-up! The conventional order of things, 
crime, humiliation, physical imperfection, nothing more had 
any meaning for these two who henceforth knew nothing in 
the world outside of themselves. In the mass of laws which 
rule all human beings love takes the place of pledges; it ip- 
terprets everything in its own terms and breaks the chains 
of honour in order to bind us together as accomplices. 

These are the memories which the room where he had 
lived through all these sweet moments with Violante brought 
back to the young man. Thus the profoimd feeling and the 
taste for life, and without any repugnance for untrammeled 
desire, the freedom from all formalities, this is what these 
friendly objects gave back to him, these backgrounds to 
their love, on Christmas eve when things inanimate can speak 
to the soul. 

Did he regret his beloved? Not at all. "For her to 
remain with us longer," he said to hhnself, "would have been 
too much, for we were surfeited; she could not have given 
us any more. Whereas now, although she is absent, every- 
thing which we could drink in from her soul dwells on in 



390 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

these things and in me. The millions of beings and things 
which today are dead, which make beautiful the forest, the 
going down of the sun, and the words of speech— eadi of 
tiiese, having contributed its share to the enrichment of the 
universe, has nothing to do but die — and thus Violante has 
enriched us and left us. 

''But Violante having enriched by herself the object of 
her love and these inanimate things has not yet played her 
r61e to its end. She has not yet expended all her vital 
force. Little unwearying seed, ^e has entrusted herself to 
the wind. She has gone to bear her soul across the sea." 

At that moment he thought of the tokens which Violante 
had sent him from far distant countries — coffers filled with 
cold, mysterious trinkets, in which were placed kind thou^ts 
of the traveller together with many tender memories. One 
by one he lifted out and handled the vases, the silks and the 
bronzes; vainly he essayed to surprise their secret, and make 
them to speak to him on this Christmas eve. 

"Among the thousand of objects down there in the ba- 
zaars, Violante has chosen these. She has chosen them, as 
she chose me, and as we chose so many pleasures with com- 
mon accord: but these strangers can tell me nothing. She 
went toward them, she understood them immediately and 
I do not understand them at all. Could it be possible that 
we were two beings living the same life, mingling our 
thoughts, so that even the most delicate nuances se^fned 
gross and snnerfliious, pnd neverflieless her instincts sij^ed 
for thincfs which for me had no meaning?" Then he recalled 
that sometimes she saw in h^ dreams grimacincr forms, fan- 
tastic and terrible, which troubled her j^nd whidi she would 
not treat as mere niditmares. She delighted in embroider- 
ing, in the beautiful garment in which her ardent spirit 
shm^bered, drap^ons, unicorns, the phenix, and the tortoise, 
which are the dream animals of the East. And descen^ng 
further Into the snirit of the exile, who often on summer eve- 
nings had tears of loy In her beautiful eyes, he recovered to 
memorv. the vibr?»tTng tones with which she us^d to dp^crlbe 
with glowing words, the ^'•''nt of roses, and death. In the 

^VPOv^ ^hwrfo nf ^^i^r-n ^"^^w ♦his ^man and tClliptgCM^ 



MA URICE BARR&S 391 

f onned to create life, loved all which made for disintegration, 
as if she would have joyed more in her beauty amongst dying 
things, and would rather have established her reign among 
the forces of decomposition. 

All these wrappmgs filled the apartment with the decaying 
odour and the deadly fever which breathes from the grave. 

"At this hour, doubtless," he dreamed, "in that country 
where decay is swiftest she has exhausted her nervous force 
and breathed away her entire soul. She has satisfied her 
boundless prodigality in lavishing upon these Chinese several 
aspects of her being with which I have never been able to 
come into contact. Perhaps too, as I may think without 
conceit, she has transmitted to them mudi that she has 
gathered from me. Her task is ended. According to her 
vow, this coffer appears before me as a sign of her death* 
I have not the strength to combat the blow which these 
events are giving me. Although we were near to each other 
during these years, our destinies were separate. I shall not 
grieve; there is already descending forgetfulness, the dust 
which effaces individual forms. I am rather disgusted to see 
that my feelings are like a thin string of curious pearls which 
dance on a loose thread. Well it was that we played music 
in this room! It raised for a paradise beyond time and 
space, where our desires, mingling at moments, gave us the 
illusion that our being was one." 

And now, having seated himself at the piano in the first 
light of that sad Christmas morning the young man hummed 
the love song of Siegmund, thinkhig that perhaps in some 
hotel in the Orient she was choosing this night on which to 
die — this night when she knew that he was living over their 
past, and mingled with his grief at her death, the clear 
vision of the immutable ways of the world aroused in him 
a feeling of impotence and bitterness. Bitter distress to 
see how few were the grains loosened from the sand on the 
bank by the ripples set circlmg by the vessel which fell into 
the whirlpool of Thule. 



THE RETURN 

(Le Retow) 

By CHARLES-LOUIS PHILIPPE 

HE had waited till evening. At about a quarter to 
seven he knocked at the door. A voice, which he did 
not immediateiy recognise, called out — ^**Come in." 
Without having to grope for it, he found the latch in the 
old place, raised it, opened the door and entered. 

His wife was not surprised. Each knock at the door, 
during the four years of his absence, had always made her 
think, "Perhans that's he coming back." She had a soup- 
tureen on her lap and was holding a loaf against her breast; 
she was slicino; bread for the soup with a motion that was 
very familiar to him. Without a word, she placed the tureen 
and the bread on a chair, then, lowering her head, she 
clutched at her apron and covered her face. He did not 
have to see her eyes to know that she was weeping. 

He sat dovvn, leaned against the back of his chair and 
not findiDg anything to say, looked the other way. He was 
utterly at a loss. 

The three children were hanging over the table around 
the lamp. The two little ones, Luden and Marguerite, were 
playing lotto. They saw that a man had come in; a man 
like all the rest who came and talked of thin;^ which did 
not interest children. They went on with their game. But 
Antoinette, the oldest, who by now was almost thirteen, and 
who was busy writing her lessons, her exercise-book wide 
open before her, recognized him almost immediately, despite 
his beard, and cried, "OhI It's papal" 

Translated by Amy Schechter. Copyright, 1917, by Boni ft 
Liveright, Inc. 

392 



CHARLES-LOUIS PHIUPPE 393 

She had grown very much. She still had those little 
tricks on account of which he had loved to tease her, because 
she had always been so ready with some amusing rejoinder. 
She could not continue her work. She got up and, as he 
had his back turned, she placed her hand on his shoulder. 
He waited no longer, but looked around at her. She was 
not timid. She considered him triumphantly and said, "It's 
a long time since you have called me the fruit of your lovel" 
She had always treasured that in her heart. When they 
had all lived together, he had hung around the inn all day 
long. He was a farrier by trade, but when a customer came 
to have a horse shoed, his wife had to send Antoinette for 
her father. Whenever he saw the child coming for him 
among the drinkers, he would turn to his companions, say- 
ing, "Here's my daughter, gentlemen, my eldest daughter, 
the fruit of my love!" Each time this would make her 
furious. 

He passed his hand over her hair, but did not dare to kiss 
her yet. Just at this moment the door opened at the push 
of a new arrival. Baptiste Pondet, a carpenter, came in with 
such assurance, that Larmingeat understood everything wi&- 
out any explanations. He rose as one rises when the head 
of the house comes in, and said, "You see, it's me." Bap- 
tiste answered, "Sit down." Then he added, "I am like your 
wife; I always thought you would come back." Then es 
they were men, and men know life, they did not keep silent 
long. Larmingeat said, "Do you think I have made a blun- 
der?" Baptist Pondet explained in turn: 

"Good Heavens! my good fellow. I — ^IVe lost my wife.'* 

"Ah! she's dead, that poor Adele." 

"Yes, and I tell you it was all over quickly. It was an 
inflammation of the lungs, lasting three days. I had lost 
the habit of being alone. She's a good woman, your wife." 

Larmingeat answered: 

"As for me, what do you want? I had so many debts 
and no work. I thought they didn't need a drunkard round 
the house. I left to get a job, I said — But I might have 
written to her." 



394 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

''Yes, at the end of three months, she understood that 
you had left her. Well, everyone has his faults." 

They were silent for a minute. They knew each other 
well, these two. They were of the same dass, they had 
served together in the 36th Artillery, at Qermont-Ferrand. 
Larmingeat remembered it and said, "Who would have 
thought of this when we were in the army." 

Such was the return of Larmingeat Such were the words 
he said. 

Tears cannot last forever. The woman lowered the apnm 
with which she was covering her face, and then she took hold 
of the tureen and the bread to go to an adjoining room^ 
which served as kitchen. Antoinette also, seeing that she 
did not understand what was going on m the room, ended 
by joining her. 

The two men remained alone, facing each other, and Lar- 
mingeat said: '1 see that it would have been better for 
me not to return." 

Baptiste Pondet answered, "Well, all right, but you had 
lo know what had happened to your wife and your children." 

They were very kind to him, as he sat shifting restlessly 
about on his diair, and seeming anxious to take his leave, 
like a person who has no reason for sta3dng. Baptiste Pon- 
det said to him: 

"But you will remain for supper with us?" 

He accepted because he could not do anything else. He 
could not go to the inn, for this was his home town. His 
wife, Alexandrina, who had somewhat recovered her confi- 
dence, heard Baptiste and was of the same opinion. She 
put her head through the doorway, not to make any remark, 
but merely to observe that there was only some soup and 
cheese and that that was little enough. Baptiste was a 
good fellow. He declared that they ought to get some pork 
and a bottle of wine. Larmingeat, not wishing to be behind, 
brought out twenty sous. He insisted on paymg for his 
bottle and said, that if there was any change, they should 
buy sweets for the children. Then he added for politeness' 
sake: 

"I am putting you to some expense." 



CHARLES-LOUIS PHIUPPE 395 

The children removed their lotto-game quickly when they 
learned that someone was dining with them. They were 
well pleased and wished to set the table. AlexaiKhind 
brought out a tablecloth which she placed on the table. 
Larmingeat objected, but she said, "Goodness, I have it; I 
may as well use it when there's company." When she re- 
turned with a small ham, some brawn, the two bottles and 
cakes, they began the meal. Larmingeat was very hungry. 
He avowed it without ceremony, and the few words he ut- 
tered were sufficient to set the conversation going. 

They asked him how he managed things, where he slept, 
where he took his meals. It's true, he had not even told 
them that he came from Paris. He slept in a hotel. He 
ate in a restaurant. The hardest thing was to get someone 
to mend his clothes. He worked at the Metropolitan as the 
subway is called. He explained what the Metropolitan was. 
Baptiste said: 

"Yes, they do all sorts of work." 

They made a good meal of it. Langevin senior was no 
longer the pork-butcher, but his son's meat was very good 
also. The two bottles were used up. If Alexandrine had 
not said that she was not thirsty, there would not have re- 
mained enough wine for the cheese. Only one thing had 
been forgotten — cigars. But Larmingeat took out his purse 
once more, and gave ten sous to Antoinette, saying, "There, 
my child, get us two cigars." She was a charming child. 
She not only went willingly, but wanted her father to come 
with her; ^e would have walked him through the town. 
Her mother had to say to her, "Come on now, leave your 
father alone, and be careful not to tell the clerk that it's 
for him. No one has to know that he is here." 

There was a fairly sad moment a little later when the 
children were being put to bed. It was easy enough with the 
little ones who were practically asleep at table. Larmingeat 
gave them two sous each, but they would not say, "Thank 
you, papa." They said, "Thank you, sir." When it was 
Antoinette's turn, she threw herself on her father. It seemed 
as if she had been quiet till then only to reserve her strength 
and to cry with more emotion. "I don't want him to go 



396 THE GREAT MODERN FRENCH STORIES 

away. I don't want him to go away." She dung to his 
neck. Her mother said, "LoolE now, yoa are hmting hm" 

They were obliged to pull her away by force, tear her 
from him and promise that he wotdd not go away. Lar- 
mingeat wept and Alexandrine and Baptiste wq>t with hint 
When she was gone, Baptiste said, ''You saw that child? 
Well, there's not a better to be found. I have always been 
sorry that she is not mine." 

When the diildren were in bed, everybody began to yawn; 
it was getting so late. All the dgars had been smolced. As 
there was not a drop to drink, they had nothing to da 
Laxmingeat knew what he had to do. He sud, " WdD, I sqp- 
pose I've got to go." 

They did not keep him back. They merely asked him 
how he had come. He had come by train. He even tdd 
diem that he had brought his valise along because at first 
he had wanted to stay. His wife said: 

'^Heavens, you should not have left the first time. What 
can you expect? I had to settle down. I cannot keq> on 
manying and unmarrying all the time. However, it tmned 
out well." 

There was a train at eleven. The station was six kilo- 
meters away and it would not do to be late as the train did 
not wait. Before he went, Baptiste, in one of those mo- 
ments in which one sums up all that one has said, remarked: 

"You see how things are with us? My funuture is here^ 
there is one bed more than in your time." 

He ^owed him the arrangement of the rooms. The land- 
lord had made some repairs. He led him into the difldren's 
room. The walls had been papered and the chimney, whidi 
used to smoke, had been fixed. The children were tight 
asleep. Larmingeat did not dare to kiss them, for fear off 
disturbing their sleep. He said, '1 see that you are leaQy 
comfortable." 

He kissed Alexandrine before leaving, then as Bapdste 
stretched out his hand, he said, ^'Come, (dd fellow, let n 
kiss, too." 



BIOGRAPHIES 

Alexandre Dumas. (Called Dumas phe, to distinguish 
him from his son.) Bom at Villiers-Cotterets, July 24, 1802. 
He was the grandson of the Marquis Alexandre Davy de la 
Pailleterie and a negress. His father, Alexandre Davy de 
la Pailleterie Dumas, was for a time a general under Napo- 
leon. Dumas studied law and was apprenticed to a notary 
of Soissons. Later he worked as secretary in the household 
of the future king, Louis-Philippe. He became engaged, as 
a Republican, in the Revolution of 1830, and resigned his 
post from the royal household. At this time he began 
writing his historical novels, and his name appears on the 
title-page of 298 volumes, including short stories, romances 
and plays. He had many literary assistants, and ran a sort 
of a fiction factory. His best work was done between 1843 
and 1850. His son rescued him from poverty in his old 
age, and he died at Puys, near Dieppe, December s, 1870. 
He was buried in 1872 at Villers-Cotterets. 

Most famous among his many books are "La Reine Mar- 
got," "Les Trois Mousquetaires," "Vignt Ans Apris," "Lc 
Vicomte de Bragelonne," and "Monte Cristo." 

Alfred de Vigny. (Alfred Victor, Comte de Vigny.) 
Bom at Loche, Indre-et-Loire, 1799. He was educated in 
Paris and served for twelve years in the army, resigning in 
1828. His first two books of poems, published between 1822 
and 1826, were philosophic epics. In 1826 his famous his- 
torical novel, "Cinq-Mars," was issued; and in 1835 his 
"Servitude et Grandeur Militaires" (from which the story 
in this volume is taken) appeared. His last days were 
passed in solitude. He died in Paris in 1863. 

Besides the books already mentioned he wrote "Lea 
Destinfe" (1864), "Stello" (1832), "Journal d'un Poite 

397 



398 BIOGRAPHIES 

(1867), and several plays, of which "Chatterton" (1835) 
was the best. 

"V- Alfred de Musset. (Alfred Louis Charles de Musset) 
^ Bom at Paris, November 11, 1810. Graduated with hon- 
ours at the College Henri Quatre. He met and loved George 
Sand in 1833, accompanying her to Italy as her secretary. 
This event was the crisis of his life. He returned to Paris 
in 1835 with a broken heart. In 1838, through the in- 
fluence of the Due d'Orl^ans, he received a post of Librarian. 
His last years were inactive and marked by mental dq>res- 
sion. He died of heart disease at Paris, May 2, 1857. 

His principal works in poetry are: "Contes d'Espagne et 
dltalie" (1830), "RoUa" (1833), and "Les Nuits" (1835- 
1837); in drama: "Caprices de Marianne" (1833), "Lo- 
renzaccio, Fantasio" (1834), "Le Chandelier" (1835), and 
"II ne Faut Jurer de Rien" (1836); in fiction: "Confession 
d'un Jeune Homme du Siecle" (1836), "Contes" (1837- 
1844), and "La Mouche" (1853). 

TnEOPHiLE Gautier. Bom at Tarbes, August 31, 181 1. 
Was educated in Paris, and became a painter. In 1836 he 
became a newspaper critic, in which field he wielded great 
influence. He was an extensive traveller and wrote several 
volumes of travel sketches. His earlier creative work was in 
the main poetry, but later he adopted prose. He was very 
prolific and tried his hand as various \ypt% of literature 
His name appeared to several hundred volumes. He died 
in Paris, October 23, 1872. 

His principal works, aside from his volumes of critidsm 
and travel sketches, are: "Poesies" (1830), "Albertus" 
(1832), "Comedie de la Mort" (1838), and "fimaux ct 
Cam^es" (1853), "L^s Jeunes France" (1833), "Made- 
moiselle de iviaupin" (1835), "Fortunio" (1838), "Ronum 
de la Momie" (1856), "Capitaine Fracasse" (1861-1863), 
and "Spirite" (1866). 

George Sand. (Armantine Lucille Aurore, Baroness 
Dudevant.) Bom in Paris, July 5, 1804, the dau^ter of 



BIOGRAPHIES 399 

Maurice Dupin, an army officer who was the grandson of 
Marshall Saxe, the illegitimate son of Augustus II, King of 
Poland. She was educated in a Parisian convent, and in 
1822 married Casimir Dudevant, a country squire, with 
whom she lived for eight years, and had two children. A 
partial separation from her husband came in 1831, and it 
was made final in 1836. In Paris she was an intimate friend 
of Musset, Chopin, Balzac, Liszt and Delacroix. She died 
in 1876. 

Among her 107 volumes of fiction, correspondence, mem- 
oirs and dramas, the principal are: "Indiana" (1832), 
"Valentine" (1832), "Lelia" (1833), "Jacques" (1834), 
"Andr6" (1835), "Leone Leoni" (1835), "Mauprat" (1836), 
"Spiridion" (1838), "Horace" (1842), "Consuelo" (1842), 
"Comtesse de Rudolstadt" (1843), "P^che de M. Antoine" 
(1847), "Jeanne" (1844), "Mare au Diable" (1846), "Te- 
verino" (1848), "La Petite Fadette" (1848), "Frangois 
le Champi" (1850), "Les Maitres Sonneurs" (1852), "Mile, 
de la Quintinie" (1863), "Confession d'une Jeune Fille" 
(1865), and "Mile, de Merquem" (1870). 

HoNOR^ DE Balzac. Bom at Tours, May 16, 1799. 
Studied law but refused to practise, and devoted his entire 
time to literature. Throughout his life he was harassed by 
poverty and depressed by debts. He married Madame Eve- 
line Hanska, a Polish lady, three months before his death. 
He died in Paris, August 18, 1850, at the height of his fame, 
with his stupendous conception, the "Comedie Humaine" 
imfinished; and was buried in Pere Lachaise. 

So great was Balzac's work, so much importance attaches 
to nearly everything he wrote, and so interdependent were 
all of his novels and stories, that it is difficult and unfair to 
make a selection of his books. The following, however, 
may be mentioned as among his best: "Eugdnie Grandet," 
"Un Menage de Gargon," "Illusions Perdues," "Pfere Goriot," 
"Cousin Bette," and "Splendeurs et Miseres des Courtc- 
saines." 



f A 



400 BIOGRAPHIES 



Y^ Prosper M^rim^e. Bom in Paris, September 28, 1803. 
Studied law and held various civil service offices. In 1831 
he became in^)ector of aiphaeological and historical monu- 
ments of France; in iS!^, an Academician; and in 1853, 
a Senator of the Empire. He died at Cannes, Septembo: 

23> 1^70- 
His principal works are: "Theatre of Qara Gazul" (1825), 

"La Guzla" (1826), "La Jacquerie" (1822), "Le Chron- 

ique de Charles IX" (1829), and many short stories, the 

principal among which being "La Venus dlUe," "Tamango," 

"Carmen," "Colomba," and "Mattto Falcone." 

GusTAVE Flaubert. Bom in Rouen, 182 1. He had a 
violent love affair with a woman whom he depicted in the 
character of "Madame Arrieux," and later a strong platonic 
friendship with Madame Colet — ^both events having con- 
siderable influence on his life and outlook. He disliked 
people in general to such an extent that he lived the life 
of a recluse. He was afiSicted with a disease which reson- 
bled epilepsy, but worked unremittingly with an almost mor- 
bid concentration. He was an intimate of the Goncourts, 
and was a kind of godfather to Maupassant. He died in 
1880. 

Despite Flaubert's enormous labours he published but 
little. "Madame Bovary," "L'fiducation Sentimentale," 
"La Tentation de Saint-Antoine," a volume of three short 
stories of which "H^rodias" is the best, and "Bouvard ct 
P^chuchet" (unfinished at his death) represent practically 
his entire production. 

Joris-Karl Huysmans. Bom in Paris in 1848, of m 
Flemish family in which there had been several distinguished 
seventeenth-century painters. At one time he retreated to m 
Trappist monastery, becoming an unprofessed member of the 
Benedictine Commimity at Liguege. His later books are 
filled with religious mysticism. He died in 1907. 

His principal works are "Marthe," "Les Soeurs Vatard,** 
"En Manage," "Li-P^," "La ^at>^<^dral," "L'Oblat," and 
"En Route." 



BIOGRAPHIES 401 

Smile Zola. Bom in Paris, April 2, 1840. His father--^ 
was a Venetian. He studied at the Lyc6e Saint-Louis, en- 
tered the publishing house of Hachette in 1862, and 
launched into journalism. In 1898 he interested himself 
in the Dreyfus case, as a result of which he was twice con- 
victed of libelling the military authorities. He fled to Eng- 
land to escape ttie sentence of six months which was im- 
posed upon him, but an amnesty in 1899 m^e it possible 
for him to return to France. Zola died on S^tember 29, 
1902, accidentally suffocated by gas. In 1908 his remains 
were transferred to the Pantheon. 

Zola's greatest work was his "Rougon-Marquart" series 
of novels which he called the "Psychological History of a 
Family Under the Second Empire." Betweai 1894 and 
1898 he published the "Three Cities" series — ^''Lourdes," 
"Rome," and "Paris." Later he began his "Four Gospels^ 
series, only three of which were &iished at his death — 
"F6condit6," "TravaU" and "V&it6." "Justice" was the 
title of the fourth. 

Guy de Maupassant. (Henri Rev^ Albert Guy de Mau- •^* 
passant.) Bom at the Chiteau of Miromesnie (Seine-Inf6- 1 
rieure) on August 5, 1850. He served as clerk in the Navy 
Department, and later as a soldier in the Franco-Prussian 
War. He fell under the influence of Flaubert (who was 
not, as is often stated, related to him), and devoted his life 
to literature. From 1887 onward traces of insanity began 
to appear in his work. In 1892 he became wholly insane, 
and died in an asylum at Passy on July 6, 1893.. 

Maupassant wrote about 200 short stories whidi appeared 
in book form between 1881 and 1890. He also wrote six 
novels— "Une Vie," "Bel-Ami," "Mont Oriol," "Pierre et 
Jean," "Fort Comme la Morte," "Notre Coeur" — ^and sev- 
eral travel volumes. 



Alphonse Daudet. Bom at Nimes in 1840. He held 
a sinecure secretaryship on the Due de Momy^s staff from 
1861 to 1865, and at flie age of twenty-seven married Mile. 
Julia Allard. In his youth he lived for a time at Lyons. 



^ 



402 BIOGRAPHIES 

but later went to Paris and threw himself into the Bohe- 
mian literary life of that dty. He died at Paris in 1897. 
His principal works are his three volmnes of Tartarin 
stories, published in 1872, 1886 and 1890; "Jack" (1876), 
"La Nabob" (1877), "Les Rois en Exil" (1879), "Roume- 
Stan" (1881), "Sapho" (1884), and two volumes of short 
yr ^stories — "Lettres de Mon Moulki" and "Contes du Lundi-'V 
From "Lettres de Mon Moulin" is taken the story s^pear- 
ing in this volume. 

Francois Coppe4. (Francois £douard Joachim Coppke.) 
Bom in Paris in 1842. For a time he was a clerk in the 
government service, but he gave up his post for literature 
and in 1869 became a member of the Parnassian School. 
He was dramatic critic of La Patrie from 1880 to 1884, 
and was elected to the French Academy in the latter year. 
He died in 1908. 

He published many volumes of poetry between 1886 and 
1 90 1. He also wrote several plays, several volumes of 
prose tales and novels, and a series of journalistic essays. 
His prose tales of the eighties include "Fille de Tristesse," 
"Henriette," "Madame Nunu," and "Le Coucher de Soleil." 
His novels are "La Coupable" and "La Bonne Souffrance," 
the latter of which records his reconciliation with the Church. 

Catulle Mend£s. Bom in Bordeaux, 1841. In 1859 
he founded the Revue Fantaisiste, the organ of the Parnas- 
sians. In 1866 he married Judith Gautier; but shortly aft- 
erward they were separated. He died in 1909. 

His best known novels are "Histoires d'Amour" (z868), 
"Le Roi Vierge" (1880), "Mephistophela" (1890), and 
"Gog" (1896). He wrote niunerous plays and librettos^ 
and three books of criticism. 

Paul Bourget. Bom at Amiens, September 2, 1852. 
His father was Russian, and his mother English. He was 
educated at the College de Sainte-Barbe, and began hb 
literary career as a joumalist. He was elected to the 
French Academy in 1894. 



BIOGRAPHIES 403 

Bourget has written many volumes of poetry, criticism, and 
travel. Among his principal works of fiction are "Cruelle 
finigme" (1885), "Un Crime d'Amour" (1886), "Andr6 
Comaius (1887), "Mensonges" (1887), "Le Disciple" 
(1889), "La Terre Promise" (1892), "Cosmopolis" (1892), 
"Un Scruple" (1893), "Le Fantome" (1901), "L'fitape" 
(1902), "Monique" (1902), "Un Divorce" (1904), and 
"L'fimigrd" (1907). 

Maurice Barr£s. Bom at Charmes-sur-Moselle, 1862. 
He entered journalistic work in 1883. In 1906 he was 
elected to the Academy, and in the same year he was reelect- 
ed to the Chamber of Deputies, of which he had been a 
member since 1889. 

Besides several volumes of essays Barris* works in- 
cluded the following volumes of fiction: "Sous TOeil des Bar- 
bares" (1888), "Un Homme Libre" (1889), "Le Jardm de 
B^rteice" (1890), "Les Ddracinfe" (1897), "L'Appel au 
Soldat" (1900), "Leurs Figures" (1902), and "Collete 
Baudoche" (1908). 

Marcel Prevost. (Eugtoe Marcel Provost.) Bom at 
Paris, May i, 1862. He was educated at the Polytechnic 
School by the Jesuits, then became a tobacco manufacturer, 
and in 1891 entered upon the literary field. He was elected 
to the French Academy in 1909. 

His published works include: "Lettres des Femmes" 
(1892), ''Nouvelles Lettres des Femmes" (1893), "L'Au- 
tomne d'une Femme" (1893), "Demi-vierges" (1894), "Le 
Jardin Secret" (1897), "Les Vierges Fortes" (1900), 
"Lettres a Frangoise" (1902), "La Princesse d^Erminge" 
(1905), "M. et Mme. Moloch" (1906), "Lettres i Franqoise 
Mariee" (1908), "Pierre et Th^rese" (1909), "Missette" 
(191 1 ), and "Letters i Frangoise Mama" (1912). 

Anatole France. (Jacques Anatole Thibault.) Bom 
in 1844. He was a courageous defender of Dreyfus and 
championed socialism in his book "Opinions Sodalistes" 
(1902). In 1896 he was elected to the Academy. 



404 BIOGRAPHIES 

His principal works are: "Le Crime de Sylvestre Bon- 
nard" (1881), "Thai's" (1890), "Les Opinions de J6rome 
Cogniard" (1893), "Le Lys Rouge" (1894), "Balthassar" 
(1899), "La Rdvolte des Anges" (1914), and "L'fitui de 
Nacre," from which the story in the present volmne was 
chosen. 

Pierre Loti. (Louis Marie Julien Vlaud.) Bom at 
Rochefort,^ January 14, 1850, of Huguenot ancestry. In 
1867 he entered the Marine Sendee and resigned in 1898 
with lieutenant's rank. He was elected to the Academy in 
1891. 

Loti's chief works are "Aziyade" (1879), "Le Manage 
de Loti" (1880), "Roman d'un Spahi (1881), "Mon Frire 
Ives" (1883), "Les Trois Dames de la Kasbah" (1884), 
"Le Pecheur dlslande" (1886), "Madame Chrysanthime" 
(1887), "Au Maroc" (1890), "Le Livre de la Piti6 et de la 
Mort," from which the sketch in this book was taken, (1891), 
"Le Desert" (1895), "La Galflee" (1895), "Ramuntcho'* 
(1897), "Matelot" (1898), "Les Demiirs Jours de Pekm" 
(1901), "Llnde" (1903), "Vers I^ahan" (1903), "La 
Troisieme Jeunesse de Mme. Pnme" (1905), "Les D6sen- 
chantees" (1906), "La Mort de Philae" (1908), "La Pderan 
d'Angkor" (1912), "The Daughter of Heaven," in collab- 
oration with Judith Gautier (19 13), "On life's Byways" 
(1914), and "War" (1917). 

Charles Louis-Philippe. Bom in 1875 of a famfly of 
nomadic beggars. He was educated at the Polytedmic 
School, confining himself to the study of mathematics. 
Later he gave his entire time to writing. His career was cut 
short by his premature death in 1909. 

His principal works include "La Mfere et I'Enfant," "Bubu 
de Montpamasse," "Pere Perdrix," "Marie Donadieu," 
"Croquignole," "Charles Blanchard," and "Dans le Petit 
Ville," from the last of which wa<( taken the story whidi 
appears in the present volume. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



It is not until one goes seriously on the search for good 
English translations of standard foreign literature that the 
paucity of such books is revealed. Adequate editions of the 
best French writers are especially rare, and the result is that 
America knows French literature largely through poor ver- 
sions which fall far short of doing justice to the originals. 
Many eminent writers of France have not been translated 
at all; some have appeared only in abridged and incompe- 
tent English editions; and others, whose works were wdl 
translated years ago, are not now available to American read- 
ers because of their books having long been out of print. 

In the following list it has not been my piupose to set 
down a complete bibliography of all the good books at pres- 
ent obtainable. Rather have I sought to be suggestive; and 
with that object in view I have indicated only the more im- 
portant of the French translations issued by American pub- 
lishing houses, in view to helping the reader to a selection. 
Most of the books listed are in print: the others are occa- 
sionally to be foimd on the market. 

In the case of Dumas' works the translation is not of the 
foremost importance. Their contents represent the primary 
interest. Therefore it is safe to buy any Dumas novel vfbidi 
bears the imprint of a reputable and established firm. Little, 
Brown & Co., for instance, publish an edition in forty-nine 
volumes; and many of the best Dumas novels are to be found 
in Croweirs "Pocket Library." 

Alfred de Vigny has almost entirely escaped translation 
into English. His "Cinq-Mars" was once issued by Little, 
Brown & Co., and it may still be found in the second-hand 
book stores. 

Alfred de Musset has suffered the same fate as Vigny. 
Barrie published an edition of his "Confessions of a Child of 
the Century," translated by T. F. Rogerson; and several 

40s 



406 BIBUOGRAPHY 

cheap editions have since appeared. But Brentano's "Tales" 
by Musset, including the story reprinted in this volume, is 
the most representative volume of this author's in English. 
It contains several of his best stories, and they are well trans- 
lated. 

Thfophile Gautier, on the other hand, possesses a com- 
plete English edition, published by Little, Brown & Co., in 
seventeen volumes. Ten of these volumes are devoted to 
Gautier's romances, and the other seven to his "Travels" — 
in reality making two sets, for it is possible to buy the ten 
volumes of romances without the seven travel volumes, and 
vice versa. The translation is by F. C. de Sumichrast, pro- 
fessor of French at Harvard University; and he has done his 
task with painstaking care, with a fine sense of values for 
Gautier's gifts, and with a striking capacity for writing fluent 
English. Brentano, also, has what is perhaps the finest small 
collection of Gautier stories in English — "One of Cleopatra's 
Nights," done into beautiful diction by Lafcadio Heam. 
Another excellent single-volume collection is Putnam's "Gau- 
tier" in the "Little French Masterpieces" series, translated 
by George Bumham Ives. 

There was once a very good translation of George Sand's 
novels, published by Little, Brown & Co., but they are now 
out of print and can be foimd only in the second-hand stores. 

One of the greatest shortcomings in American publishing 
is the absence of any first-class and complete edition of Bal- 
zac. The Saintsbury edition is expurgated and incompetent; 
and the so-called Wormeley edition is, if anything, worse. 
The only set of Balzac which can be recommended is the 
subscription edition published by Barrie. It is by far the 
best in English. (The set bearing the imprint of Gebbie is 
the same as the Saintsbury edition with Dutton's on Dent's 
imprint.) 

Innumerable translations of some of M^rim^e's works (e»- 
pcially "Carmen" and "Colomba") have appeared in Eag* 
lish, but a really excellent complete edition is yet to appear. 
The set issued by Frank S. Holby is not particularly good» 
but some of M^rim^e's shorter writings, adequately trans- 
lated, are to be found in Putnam's "Uttle Frendb Master* 



BIBUOGRAPHY 407 

pieces" series, and in "Stories" (Dutton's "Worid's Story 
TeUers Series"). 

Flaubert is extremely difficult to translate, but neverthe- 
less there are adequate English versions of his more import- 
ant works. Henry James once translated "Madame Bovary" 
and it is well to try to get this book, although it is now out of 
print. Then there is another translation, which will answa: 
purposes of study, in the "Modem Library." "Salambo" 
has been translated several times, but the one bearing the 
name of M. French Sheldon and originally published by 
Lovell, Coryell & Co., is perhaps the best. "The Temptation 
of Saint Anthony" was translated by Lafcadio Heam and 
issued several years ago by the Alice Harriman Publishing 
Co. This is by all means thfe volume one should try to get. 
The three short stories by Flaubert, translated by George 
Bumham Ives and issued by Putnams in their "Little Frendi 
Masterpieces" series, are wholly adequate. 

In buying Zola translations it is alwa)^ well to demand 
the excellent Vizetelly edition. These books are authoritive 
and the best of their kind available. Not all of them have 
American imprints, but they may be had, nevertheless, in 
their coimtry. The Marion Co. have issued "Abb6 Mou- 
ret's Confession," "The Dramshop," "The Fat and the Thin," 
"His Masterpiece," and "The Joy of Life;" and Macmillans 
have issued "Doctor Pascal" and "The Downfall." 

There are many translations of Daudet in English, and 
"Sapho" has appeared in numerous editions. In buying 
Daudet, however, one should be guided by the publisher's 
imprint. Look always for the name of a reliable house. 
Little, Brown & Co. put out an adequate set. "Letters from 
My Will" and "Monday Tales" (representing Daudet's best 
short stories) are issued in Putnam's "Little French Mas- 
terpieces" series. 

Maupassant has suffered at the hands of translators more 
than any other French writer of note, and the vast majority 
tof the American editions of Maupassant are practically worth- 
less. The best, though imfortunately not complete, edition 
is published by P. F. Collier & Sons in ten volumes. Then 
there are two volumes of stories issued by Harpers — "The 



4o8 BIBUOGRAPHY 

Odd Number" and "The Second Odd Number"— which are 
wholly excellent. One has an introduction by Henry James, 
the other an introduction by William Dean Howells. Also 
there is a first-rate small collection of stories in Putnam's 
"Little French Masterpieces" series. 

The works of Huysm^s have never been issued in Amer- 
ica. One or two of his later novels, which are not his best, 
were translated and published in Eiigland; but, aside from 
these, there is none of this writer's work available in Eng- 
lish. 

The only representative collection of Coppfe's stories in 
English is published by Harper & Bros, in their "Odd 
Number" series — "Tales by Coppfe." The book is well 
translated and, in its limited way, answers every purpose. 
"The Guilty Man," translated by Ruth Helen Davis, was 
published by Dillingham in 19 12. 

Catulle Mendes has been wholly neglected in English, and 
the United States Catalogue records not a single translation 
of any one of his books. Stories have appeared here and 
there in magazines, but, so far as I can find out, no book 
has appeared. 

Anatole France, however, has been done into English with 
a greater thoroughness and competency than has any other 
modem French writer. John Lane Co. publish a complete 
edition, capably translated and beautifully bound. Also "The 
fled Lily" and^"The Crime of Sylvestre 6onnard^q)pear in 
the "Modem Library," the latter translated by Lafcadio 
Heam. 

No complete edition of Pierre Loti has appeared in Eng- 
lish, but several of his best works are available in good trans- 
lations. "The Book of Pity and of Death," translated by T. 
P. O'Connor, was published by Cassell, and copies of it may 
still be found. The Macmillans issued "Carman Sylva, and 
Sketches from the Orient," "On Life's Byways" (both trans- 
lated by Fred Rothwell), and "Disendianted" (translated 
by Clara Bell). McClurg issued "The Island Fishennan'' 
(translated by A. F. de Koven) ; and Dutton isaied "Bia- 
clame Chrysantheme" (translated by L. Ensor). 

The best translations of Bourget are on the Scrfboer Hit